Blood
by Incidental Vegan Cannibal
Summary: Elizabeth fights like a girl, with secrets and running and tears and hiding, and she leads her followers with the heart of a general. Booker should have stuck her in a suitcase and swam to New York while he still had a chance. [WWI AU where Booker and Elizabeth went straight to Paris on The First Lady.]
1. Chapter 1

Quick Notes/Warnings: (spoilers abound!)

1. This starts in August 1914, 25 months or so after Booker and Elizabeth escaped Columbia. If you're not familiar with World War I history, I recommend at least reading about the First Battle of the Marne, especially the role taxis played in the Allies winning. That's where this fictional dimension will split off from "canon" (our history). However, I think the story can still be enjoyed without knowing much about it. Up to you!

2. If you haven't read the first two parts of this series, I highly recommend doing that first. They're located on Ao3 due to fanfiction dot net's ridiculous rule forbidding 2nd person POV. I don't feel like rehashing how Booker and Elizabeth went from awkward lovers to awkward parent/child to awkward married couple, lol, but I'm happy to send you a link if you're interested. **This is not one of those AU fics where it turns out they're not related.** In this story, Booker and Elizabeth have a complicated, semi-functional, but very loving relationship, and I hope I've done it justice. If incest is not your cup of tea, no need to leave a nasty comment- just hit the back button. Practically every other Booker/Elizabeth fic on here is based in an un-incestuous AU, so just read one of those rather than bashing this fic. Please and thank you!

3. I studied French for several years in university, but it's been a while. If you notice any mistakes in my French or English, or if you'd like to beta any French phrases I run into, please let me know! Also, don't worry if you don't know a single word of French- I've only used it in a handful of places to strengthen the connection between reader and (non-French-speaking) protagonist, since chances are neither of you are fluent. Additionally, the context will provide everything you need to know, so it shouldn't be frustrating. :)

Thanks for reading! Enjoy.

* * *

Elizabeth should have been enjoying the bright Paris summer like other girls her age: shopping, dancing, sunbathing naked on the roof. Instead, she spent her August reading all the papers and worrying about the war. Just about every night, she trotted along next to Booker, regurgitating the propaganda she'd read that day, while he did his safety patrol through the halls of her brothel.

"Did you read the paper today, Booker?"

"Yep." He checked a window to make sure it was locked. "Taxi drivers are still on strike. Guess we'll have to keep taking the bus, huh?"

"Be serious, Booker." She crossed her arms. "The Germans are getting closer every day. Did you read about Leuven? They executed over two-hundred people, and they burned down so many buildings people are still counting."

"Glad I don't live in Leuven," Booker joked. He wished she'd stop reminding him about the lurking danger at all hours of the night and day. He was already well aware of it.

"Booker!" Her nostrils flared. "This is not funny! Who knows how many women they're raping and mutilating _as we speak_? They're taking many of them back to Germany for 'hard labor.' What if the Triple Entente bombs Germany and those poor people are the ones standing out in the fields?"

Booker pressed his ear to a door, listened for a second, and then continued walking. "Then that'll be a damn shame. But that's in Belgium-"

"And it will be in France, too!" Elizabeth made an exasperated noise. "The Germans aren't even at war with Belgium! Belgium is as neutral as the U.S., they just happen to be standing between us and the Germans. What'll happen when the Germans get their hands on the people they actually hate?"

"Hate? They're not invading other countries because they hate them. It's not personal like that."

Elizabeth put her hands on her hips. "Oh really? Then why are they murdering and raping so many people if they don't hate them?"

"I don't know." Booker fiddled with a loose doorknob to keep from having to think too hard about his own past. "Folks in charge get some crazy, power-hungry idea in their head, and they stir up the folks down below 'til the whole group gets caught up in a frenzy. It's like a cattle stampede."

By the time he said the last word, they'd reached their bedroom door. Elizabeth pushed open the door and immediately threw her silk robe over the bench in front of her vanity. Jack, her Pit Bull guardian, hopped up off his cushion on the floor and sniffed the back of Elizabeth's hand, his tail wagging. He licked her knuckles, and she scratched him behind the ears without looking at him.

"You never answered my question," Elizabeth said. "What will happen to us when the Germans get their hands on us?"

"We're Americans," Booker said. "They'd send us home."

"You know they wouldn't." She sat down at her vanity. "They didn't do that to the American family in Leuven. It was in the paper today. He was a reporter, there on business. The Germans raped his wife, burned down his house, and then shot all four of them-even the children- in the heads."

"That's not gonna happen to us."

Elizabeth loosened the pins holding her hair in the chignon bun at her neck, and her creased brown locks tumbled down her back. "Even you couldn't take on a whole army at once, Booker." She dragged the comb through her tangles. "If the Germans take Paris, we're as good as dead."

He sighed. "Look, if they get even a little bit close, I plan on tossing you into a suitcase and sticking you on the next train to New York."

"I think there might be some logistical problems with that plan," she said.

"Yeah, I'd have to stick some padding in the suitcase first to keep you from getting tossed around all that extra room," he teased. "Maybe I'll stick Jack in there too, so you have some company. But my point is, you're gonna be gone the second the Germans get close, whether you feel like getting gone or not. I don't care if I have to drug your tea. I want you safe."

She used the mirror's reflection to give him _that look_, the one she put on whenever he suggested something really stupid and offensive, like that time he suggested she save money on her huge dinners by adding stray cat meat and calling it the "Chinaman Special." "If you do that, I will never, ever forgive you, Booker. I'm not a child."

Bloodwise, she was _his_ child, if not _a_ child. But since the two of them had agreed nearly two years ago that memory trumped blood, Booker decided not to mention that. Trying to play his paternity like an ace would probably end in divorce.

"I don't care," he said. "I'm not gonna let the Germans do anything to you, and if I can't take all of them in a fight, then I can take you in a boat."

Elizabeth stabbed at her tangles with the comb so hard it sounded like ripping. "I mean it, Booker. If you kidnap me away from my business and the women who rely on me for safety, I will hate you for the rest of my life."

"Yeah, but you'll have a nice, long, hopefully rape-less life to hate me, so I think I can make peace with that."

She slammed the comb down on the vanity. "If you're going to make all my choices for me, then I might as well still be locked up on Monument Island! You had the chance to be my father, and you turned the job down. _Twice._ Orphan Girl will decide her own fate, thank you very much." With that, she threw herself into bed and pulled the blanket up to her ears.

Jack ran over and barked twice up at Booker.

"Hey, don't bark at me, you mutt," Booker said. "Ain't no one else gonna feed you scraps and throw your rubber ball around the yard."

Jack gave one more half-hearted bark before jumping onto the bed. He turned in a circle three times before lying down in the corner Elizabeth's feet never quite managed to reach. Elizabeth rolled onto her stomach, keeping her face pointed toward the wall opposite Booker.

Jack, on the other hand stared right at him. In Booker's mind, he could all but hear the damn dog saying, _"Hey, Stupid. You upset my human. Fix it and make her happy again, or I will shit in your shoe while you sleep."_

"Look, Elizabeth, it doesn't matter." Booker stripped down to his underwear and slipped into the sheets. The bed was already too warm from Elizabeth's body heat. He pulled her against him and kissed her shoulder anyway. "There's no point in fighting over it. Paris is too well-loved for anyone to let it fall. Even the United States would come defend us if it came down to it."

"Really?" She rolled onto her other side and stared at him. "Because I have a really bad feeling about all of this."

"And I have a feeling you're gonna sweat to death if you keep that nightshirt on in this heat." He pulled the offending fabric up her stomach. "Come on, take it off, and I'll make you glad you did."

"I know what you're up to," she said, but she took her nightshirt off anyway. "We're about to go to war and all you can think about is sex."

"Sex and food," he corrected her.

"Sex and food." She tucked her hands under her head, exposing her perfect little breasts to the cooler air. "Men are such animals. No wonder we're at war."

"Hey now." He cupped the breast closest to him and traced his tongue over the soft nipple. "That's just plain hurtful. And hurtful girls don't get their pussies licked."

"Such vulgar language, Mr. DeWitt!" She smirked and grabbed his hair. "And of course we get our pussies licked, because men like you can't get enough of them. In fact, I think you're the most enthusiastic when I'm extra-hurtful."

That much was true. As a result, when Booker finally stretched out to sleep, it was with a crick forming in his neck, ten long scratches scabbing over on his back, and a blissful wife smiling into his shoulder. Her damp, loose hair and her pink skin made her look more damn beautiful (if also more vulnerable) than ever. He could kinda see why someone would want to lock her up in a tower.

"If we're going to die soon, we need to have more sex like that," she said.

"We're not gonna die soon," he said, touching two fingers to her curved bottom lip. "I promise, Elizabeth, I will keep you safe no matter what."

He should have known better than to make promises he couldn't keep.


	2. Chapter 2

The Germans took the whole of Belgium during the first week of September, and the French army took every able-bodied male they could get their hands on in even less time. It didn't help, though. No matter how many little boys carried their guns into the trenches, the Germans crept further and further into France, like spilled paint ruining a new carpet. Marie, Elizabeth's "very best friend in the entire world," spent a lot of time locked alone in her room after her fifteen-year-old brother ran off to join the French Army.

Elizabeth worked herself into a fit of constant worry over the invasion. Her nerves made her stomach too uneasy to tolerate most foods, but hunger seemed to make her violently ill. It was rare to find her without a hunk of plain bread or a cup of lemon tea in her hand. She insisted to everyone but Booker and Marie that she was "fasting for peace." She took to napping in the afternoons, crying herself to sleep at night, and then waking up several times before dawn, usually to use the toilet and then pace a hole in the carpet. Booker took to getting up after her and keeping her company.

"That suitcase to New York must be sounding awful pleasant right about now," Booker said one October night as he brushed perfumed oil into Elizabeth's hair. He'd woken up to her kicking him in the shin and thrashing around in the sheets, apparently due to a painful leg cramp that had jolted her out of her own sleep.

She looked up from the newspaper she'd propped on her vanity. "You're right. It does. But I'm not going to abandon my friends. So unless-" She paused to swallow some tears, which seemed to happen every time she felt any strong emotion lately. "Unless you can fit all of them in suitcases, too, I'm staying right here. You can leave if you want."

"Come on, you know me better than that. Ain't got anything else in my life worth living for, much less dying for. You ready to try to sleep again?"

She shook her head and went back to reading the paper. Booker got bored and practiced plaiting her hair. When he got a decent-looking one, he fumbled with a ribbon until he secured the braid.

"So what's the new tragedy tonight?" he asked.

"Lille," she replied. "We lost the whole town to the Germans."

"You wanna talk about it?"

She shook her head and then pressed her fingers over her eyelids, trying to hold back the tears. It didn't work.

"I thought I was done having odd nightmares," she said, rubbing at her eyes. "I'm exhausted all the time, and my stomach and head hurt all day, but I can't sleep well because of these awful, bizarre dreams. When I dream, the things that happened in Columbia get mixed up with the things I read about in the papers. I can't bear being so anxious every hour, even while I sleep."

Booker crossed his arms so his hands wouldn't feel so awkward and helpless. "We could call the doctor."

"No. I don't need to pay someone who's already incredibly busy to tell me that I'm suffering from stress."

"Your decision," Booker said with a shrug.

She wiped her eyes. "Just go back to bed, Booker. I'm going to bother Marie for some tea and girl talk."

He kissed her forehead and bade her goodnight. Once she was gone, Booker took the newspaper and lay down on the bed to try to decipher it.


	3. Chapter 3

By the start of November, the fighting was happening not quite thirty miles away from Elizabeth's little bordello. The atmosphere in said bordello was anxiously festive, at least until the French and English soldiers left in the mornings and everyone could go back to being plain old anxious. Booker told goofy jokes and gave the girls shooting lessons during the day to ease the tension.

Elizabeth, ever the persuasive leader, served tea and coffee every afternoon while she bolstered her prostitutes' morale with speeches. Most of her speeches contained poetic shit like "Thank you for taking such good care of our brave protectors and fortifying their hearts!" and "The unification of French and English bodies in this building is beautiful, because it symbolizes the unification of two countries' hearts and wills!" (Or maybe she said 'volunteers'; Booker's French still wasn't so great, even after two years of being surrounded by it.)

For all her grand words, Elizabeth didn't handle the stress so well once she was in the privacy of her bedroom. Her stress headaches and nervous stomach had turned into full-blown episodes where she would suddenly became dizzy and faint, and breathing became painful and damn near impossible. Her heart would beat so fast Booker was scared it would burn itself up. Elizabeth wanted to keep her illness a secret, though, and so Booker did his part and made up stories about her frequent napping and puking and nosebleeds.

Those nosebleeds were somethin' else, though. Twice a week, Tuesdays and Fridays, Elizabeth always disappeared for two hours and always came back with a nosebleed. Each one seemed to be worse than the last. Many good towels were lost in the never-ending battle against nosebleeds.

"Where the hell are you going when these happen?" Booker asked one afternoon as he held Elizabeth's nostrils pinched shut with a small towel. "Maybe you should stop going there before you bleed to death."

She was sitting on the kitchen counter, leaning forward into his hand. "I've been pulling food out of tears," she said. Her voice was muffled by the towel and her closed-off nose. "Feeding the armies. Sometimes I find ammo caches or medical supplies. It's been two years; I don't think Comstock will be able to trace me here. We all have to do our part to fight the Germans."

Booker shook his head. "You don't have to do anything. They'll find a way without you."

"I don't get to be a secret war hero, is that it?" Elizabeth demanded. "You think I should stay home where it's safe and boring?"

"No, of course not," Booker said, and then he paused. "Well, actually, yeah. I'm in favor of you staying where you're safe."

"Tough," she said, taking the towel from him. "I'm going to keep fighting any way I can. Will you bring me something cold to put on my nose, please?"

The nosebleeds continued, and the other episodes along with them. Her illness scared the hell out of Booker, who tried again to convince her to call a doctor over. Elizabeth refused to "distract them from tending to wounded soldiers." She added a morning nap a few hours before the afternoon one, an attempt to combat the exhaustion. Booker took on half of her chores and kept her well-supplied with bread and tea.

On November 8, 1914, Booker and the other residents of _l'Oiseau Chanteur_ were finishing their evening meal when explosions shook the windows. The bombs had never fallen that close before.

"It's probably just the wind blowing the noise toward us," Booker assured the eleven ladies rushing to the windows. "Go get ready for your night clients, just like usual."

"I don't think there will be many," Marie said softly as the others left. "I hear everyone has been sent to the front tonight."

"Still, better for you ladies to be ready, right?" Booker said.

"Indeed," she said with a smile. "Tell Elizabeth to come chat with me when she's awake, if I'm not busy then."

"Will do."

Since Elizabeth was still napping, Booker handled the post-dinner cleanup. As he drained the dishwater, he heard gunshots and shouts over the gurgle. He wiped his hands on the towel and stepped out into the red glow of the lantern above the front door. Most of the neighbors had also gathered on the street.

He waved over a young boy and tried to remember how Elizabeth had taught him to ask him what was going on. "Uh... _tu es... au courant de... de ce qui... s'est passé?_"

"_Oui, monsieur._" The boy stared up at the thick, black smoke that was floating in and dimming the city lights overhead. "_Les Forces de l'Entente retraitent. Les Alliés ont abandonné la France._"

"No," Elizabeth whispered from behind Booker. "No, they can't just leave us..."

Booker's head jerked around. She was leaning against the door jamb, her coat pulled over her nightshirt. Her naked toes were curled around the threshold. He put his hand on her arm.

"Come on, let's get you back inside. It's not gonna be safe out here, and you're already feeling poorly."

She shook her head and refused to budge. "This is going to be in all the history books one day. I want to stay out here for a little while."

He stood with her on the street, his big arm around her tiny shoulders. She didn't cry, which surprised him after the flood of tears she'd all but drowned him with since August. Instead, she stared at the smoke and lights for a long time, and then she suddenly marched inside and made three pots of tea. Booker sat at the kitchen table and tried to hear the Germans crossing their shiny new Marne River over the whistle of the kettle.

"Booker, where do you keep your things from Columbia?" Elizabeth asked.

"Why?"

She twisted her jeweled band off her left ring finger and put it in his hand. "I don't want them to take this away. Will you put it somewhere safe for me?"

He stood up, wrapped the ring in a handkerchief, and then dropped it into an empty coffee tin. "Keep a lookout," he said, prying open the hinged floorboard he'd installed. He set the coffee tin next to his Sky Hook and closed the trap door.

"Thanks." Elizabeth rubbed at the red line on her naked finger. "Now will you please make sure Jack is locked in our room and then tell everyone to come to the kitchen?"

Once everyone was gathered around the table, Elizabeth cleared her throat and began the speech she'd been practicing on Booker for the past two weeks. It was the first time she'd dared to recite it in French since she'd penned the words. She stood up as straight as she could, cradling her teacup in both hands.

"_Ladies, as most of you already know, Paris will soon be under German occupation. We know from our sisters in Lille that the German troops can be unspeakably brutal to women, but that they are sometimes kinder to women who cooperate with them. I recommend that we do whatever is necessary to survive. There are other ways to fight than to pick up a gun. We have a unique opportunity to learn things that may be useful to the resistance. I will never force you to do anything you don't want to, so if you want to leave, you have my blessing. But if you stay, I promise I will do everything in my power to protect you. My allegiance is to you and only you. Whatever you choose, my prayers will be with you. It's been a pleasure working with all of you, and may God protect us all."_

It was obvious from the weeping and arguing that most of Elizabeth's whores weren't real pleased about having to share their home and bodies with the invaders, especially when there was no guarantee the Germans wouldn't just murder them all anyway. None of the girls left, though, with the exception of Marie, who left looking grim and returned with four suitcases and her two unmarried sisters, looking even grimmer. The younger sisters were sixteen and eighteen, but they looked a whole lot younger. They clung to Marie's side, slowing their older sister's steps to a near-crawl.

"These are my sisters, Chloe and Claire," Marie announced. "They both speak English- don't let them trick you into thinking otherwise, as they are quite shy! Chloe studied some German. They both want to work here with me."

"_Êtes-vous certaines?_" Elizabeth asked the young ladies.

"_Oui_, better to give it away than have it stolen," Marie answered for them, brushing her fingers through their blond hair, as if fucking enemy soldiers was no big deal. "I will teach them everything. _Ne t'en fais pas, ma chère._ Just run your brothel. I know you are busy and tired."

Elizabeth seemed shaken by the idea of serving up such young-looking girls to the invading army, but she didn't get a chance to dwell on it. The rhythmic clap of thousands of boots hitting the streets at the same time got louder and louder until it was a practically roar. Men were shouting things in German, Booker thought, and then realized they were speaking in heavily accented French.

"What are they saying?" Booker asked.

"They want us to stay in our homes and remain calm," Elizabeth translated. "They say to hand over all weapons."

A few minutes later, the front door burst open, causing screams. No one ran, though. Elizabeth was a damn fine leader.

"_Haut les mains!_" The soldiers shouted, aiming their firearms all over the room. "_Haut les mains!_"

All of the women put their hands on their heads, so Booker grudgingly did the same. One soldier patted Booker down and confiscated his pistol, while the others searched the women. Apparently, the Germans were real worried about women storing firearms in their brassieres and skirts. Booker ground his teeth and focused his attention on the gun pointed at his face. He couldn't do any good for Elizabeth or her whores if he was dead.

Elizabeth held perfectly still while they groped her and poked their fingers down the front of her corset. She didn't even blink. It was all the more impressive to Booker, since he knew Elizabeth was secretly terrified of men in uniforms. The other women followed her stoic example, although with the occasional exclamation or sniffle.

A soldier with a more decorated uniform approached Booker with a notepad.

"_Cet établissement est un bordel, non? Tu es le propriétaire?_"

Booker tilted his head sideways, trying to understand the accent. "Uhhh..."

Elizabeth raised her hand just off her head. "_Je suis la propriétaire de ce bordel. En France, des femmes possédent touts les bordels._"

Booker eavesdropped on their conversation, trying to figure out what they were talking about. It sounded like the soldier was taking an inventory of all the people and goods in the building, and Elizabeth was assuring him they would all cooperate and provide whatever the Germans needed. Another soldier poked around the entire building, verifying whatever Elizabeth was explaining. Booker went stiff as the nosy soldier stepped onto the false floorboard. The soldier continued walking, and Booker's shoulders sank in relief.

More soldiers came and left all night, asking Elizabeth endless questions at first and then settling in with their packs of belongings as it drew closer to morning. Booker sat in the corner with his arms crossed, watching everyone. Elizabeth hurried around serving tea and coffee and snacks. Marie spoke softly in French to her sisters, occasionally gesturing approvingly to a fellow prostitute sitting on a German soldier's lap or forcing a smile at a compliment. When Booker finally escorted Elizabeth to bed, Marie was in the process of charming the quietest soldier in the room into a threesome with both of her virgin sisters.

They both undressed in silence. Elizabeth lay on her back, staring up at the ceiling cracks and holding Jack in her arms. Booker lay down next to her. He could still hear marching and the occasional gunshot, but it was dulled by harsh laughter from downstairs.

"Elizabeth?"

She turned her head to look at him. "Yes?"

"I don't know how this is going to play out."

"Are you scared, Booker?"

He went quiet for a minute. "Yeah," he finally answered. "I am."

"So am I." Elizabeth found his hand under the blanket. "But I won't let anything bad happen to us."

"I won't either." He warmed her tiny, cold hands in his. "Give me a few months, and I'll figure out a plan to get us somewhere with less Germans and more dancing."

A smile flickered over her face for just a second. "Good," she said.

Neither of them felt much like sleeping. After a half hour of tossing and turning, Elizabeth straddled him and guided him inside her. Neither of them was in the right mindset to properly enjoy it, but Booker felt a hell of a lot more peaceful when they finished. Elizabeth didn't seem to share his relaxation. Either way, when Booker woke up, the sun was peeking under the curtains and Elizabeth was still sandwiched between him and Jack.


	4. Chapter 4

By the end of the first week of the occupation, Booker had learned enough German to order a beer and ask a woman to do pretty much anything he could imagine wanting. Elizabeth became friendly with the lone English-speaking soldier at the brothel, Hauptmann Adler, and traded English lessons for German ones. The jokes Adler cracked with his new English skills made Elizabeth laugh nervously and made Booker wish he had enough salts left to sic a murder of crows on the Fritz.

They marched the French and British prisoners-of-war through the streets after three days of occupation, during a mandatory roll call for all the civilians. The Germans didn't say where they were being marched to, just that anyone who tried to speak to them would be shot. Booker recognized a couple of the troops as former visitors of Elizabeth's bordello. Elizabeth rested her head on Booker's shoulder and pulled his arm around her shoulders, as if it was a shawl that could keep out the chill of reality.

Elizabeth found excuses to slip away from the brothel at least once a day, although what she was out doing was a mystery to Booker. She came back with a nosebleed sometimes, but more often than not she just came back with a sad look on her face. After some pestering, Booker learned that some of Elizabeth's former acquaintances in town had started spitting in her direction and calling her "_collaboratrice._"

"They're just upset about the Germans," Booker said, watching her nervously. He never knew what would set her off anymore. She hadn't shed a single tear over the invasion, and yet Jack pissing on the carpet or Marie looking "annoyed" with her was enough to turn her into a weeping, inconsolable mess.

"I know they are," Elizabeth said, crossing her arms and leaning against the counter. "They're angry at the Germans, but they take it out on me because I won't shoot them for spitting at me."

"You're wise beyond your years, you know that?"

She smiled. "I simply refuse to be ashamed of doing what's necessary to survive. If this brothel didn't exist, the Germans would round up a dozen unwilling girls and force them into prostitution. I forgive the neighbors for taking out their anger on me, and I forgive myself for 'collaborating' with the Germans. Everything will balance out before the end."

"Good for you," Booker said, and he meant it.

On Wednesday the eighteenth, stomach pains kept Elizabeth confined to her bed. Booker ignored her assurances that she would go to the hospital the next day for an exam, and the doctor arrived a few hours later to check on her. An irritated Elizabeth banished Booker downstairs for the duration of the doctor's visit. It was just as well, because Chloe or Claire (he couldn't keep track of which was which) immediately claimed his attention with news of water spewing out from under the house.

The doctor left while Booker was still under the house, trying to pry off a stuck bit of the broken pipe. He was gonna need to replace the whole system, and sooner sounded better than later. He probably should've done it before the war started, but there was no changing the past. Not unless you were Elizabeth, anyway, and it sounded like Elizabeth was too busy with the evening cooking to change the past right then. Booker was still down there when Hauptmann Adler arrived home for the evening.

"Frau DeWitt!" came the accented voice through the floorboards. "Your cooking smells delicious, as always! Is your husband out?"

"I... I'm not sure," Elizabeth said. "Did anyone see him leave?"

She sounded strained, uneasy- even more than usual. Booker wiped his forehead on his sleeve. The lantern was so weak that for all he knew, he'd just replaced the sweat with dirt. As everyone upstairs professed their ignorance of Booker's whereabouts, he scooted around until he found a gap through the floorboards that let him spy into the living room. He'd suspected the captain bullied Elizabeth when he thought Booker wasn't around, and this was the perfect chance to find out for sure. Not that he would be able to do much if he was right, but he didn't care for being left in the dark.

"How was your day, Hauptmann?" Elizabeth asked politely.

"It was fine, as usual." Adler strode over and sat down on the sofa. "Sit with me for a moment! Someone else can mind the stove."

Booker could see his wife's muscles tense, even through a half-inch peephole, but she sat down anyway.

"Would you like some tea?" she asked.

"No, no, I want your company! Sit with me!" Adler put his arm around her shoulder. "I've been thinking about that kiss all day."

_Kiss?_ Booker frowned. _What kiss?_

"I've been thinking about it too." Elizabeth touched her lips. "My mouth is still sore."

"I will be more gentle this time, I promise." Adler grabbed Elizabeth's head and pulled her in for a kiss.

Elizabeth's hand flew to his shoulder, and it looked like she was going to push him away. At the last second, she froze and then stroked her fingers down his arm. When he finally released her, she gave a short chuckle that was just a little too high-pitched to be genuine.

"You're so daring, Hauptmann Adler, but my husband will be home any minute." She made it sound almost like a polite threat.

Adler snorted. "And what would he do about this? Attack me? He would have to be a fool. Look at all the soldiers here."

He kissed her again. Elizabeth let him, but she didn't look too happy about it. Booker thought about charging in, but the goddamn Fritz was right. Assuming Booker even reached his weapons box in a decent amount of time, and assuming he managed to kill every last Boche in the brothel without hurting the women, there was still an entire country's worth of soldiers outside. It would be pretty damn hard to protect Elizabeth if he was dead.

When the second kiss ended, Adler put his hand behind Elizabeth's head. "You see what you do to me? I know you take such good care of your guests, Frau DeWitt. Won't you take care of this matter, as well?"

"Oh... but... but I'm not a prostitute anymore," Elizabeth sputtered. "I'm a married woman now. I just run the house and take care of everyone, like an innkeeper."

"But good leaders lead by example, _ja_? How can you expect all these women to make love to the soldiers if you refuse to do your duty? You should be a good example for them."

Booker strained his head and saw that Adler had unbuttoned his trousers. That son of a bitch...

Elizabeth drew a deep breath, and then forced a smile. "You're right. I have been a hypocrite. I would never, ever ask them to do anything I wouldn't also do."

She leaned forward, lowering her head to his lap. Adler grabbed a fistful of her hair and held on while she worked her mouth over him. The lewd groans he made echoed through the room. Booker realized he was gripping the wrench so hard his hand had gone numb. It wasn't like he ever forgot that Elizabeth used to be a prostitute, but he'd never seen her in action before. Maybe it wouldn't have been so hard to watch if she hadn't looked so miserable doing it.

After a few minutes, Adler fell back against the sofa and then lit a cigarette. Smoking inside the house was one of Elizabeth's biggest pet peeves, and Booker knew she would have told him off if she'd had the freedom to. As it was, she just coughed as she wiped her mouth on the back of her hand.

"We should go upstairs," Adler said after a moment. "Just the two of us. I think I could have another go at you in a minute. I want to see if your cunt feels as good as your mouth, and I think we will be less interrupted if we do it before your husband gets home."

Elizabeth froze for a second, and then she was all sweetness and apologies. "Oh, no, I'm sorry, I'm not allowed. My doctor-"

Adler scoffed. "The doctor said you can't have sex? That sounds like nonsense to me!"

"No, I swear, he was just here! He just told me..." Elizabeth reached into her coat pocket and unfolded a paper from it. Her hands were shaking so hard that even Booker could see it. She gave the paper to Adler.

He read aloud. "Plenty of healthy foods, no heavy exercise, no strong drink, no sexual intercourse... Why? What is wrong with you?"

"I... I, uh." Elizabeth's hands gestured the way they did whenever she was flustered and trying to come up with a polite little lie to diplomatically weasel out of a situation. "I-"

He kept reading, and then he suddenly laughed and ripped the paper in two. "Ha! I think French women only want an excuse not to fulfill their duties! In Deutschland, women don't deny their husbands the right to their bodies for such stupid reasons. Their unborn children are never harmed from it, I promise. Come, let's go upstairs and have fun." He grabbed her arm and pulled on her.

After months of tending to Elizabeth during her 'episodes', Booker had gotten pretty damn good at telling when one was coming on. The most obvious clue she was about to have one was that a uniformed man was grabbing at her and shoving her around, let alone for sex. Even Booker knew better than to treat a woman like that, especially Elizabeth, who regularly woke up convinced she was still a starving prostitute being raped by a corrupt police officer. But more than that, there was a certain look she got on her face, a combination of the expressions she made while opening up dimensional tears and while about to start crying. Sure enough, a few seconds after she got that look on her face, she pressed her hand over her heart and doubled over.

"I can't breathe," she gasped. "I can't feel my body! I can't breathe! Oh, God, please help me-"

That was Booker's cue to step in. He crawled out from under the house, brushed the extra dirt off, and then hurried inside. By the time he got there, Elizabeth was on the floor, wheezing and clawing at her collar.

"Let me handle this," Booker said.

"What is she doing?" Adler demanded. "Is she playing a game with me?"

"No. She has these... episodes." Booker dropped onto one knee and touched Elizabeth's face. Her skin was cool and damp. He stroked his thumb over her jaw.

She barely even noticed him. "Can't breathe," she choked. "Can't feel... can't breathe..."

"What is she sick with?" Adler persisted.

Hell if Booker knew. "She's got a condition with her heart," he lied. "Real deadly. Killed her mother in childbirth. Is it okay if I put her in bed and give her her medicine?"

"_Ja_, that might be best." Adler's cigarette spilled ash on the rug. "The last thing I need is a panic from the other whores. Get her out of here until she's calm again."

Booker hefted Elizabeth over his shoulder and pushed himself onto his feet. She fought him all the way to their bedroom, breathing like she was dying the whole way. He pulled back the covers and dropped her onto the bed. She was still seemingly getting enough air to kick and slap at him while he pulled off her shoes and unbuttoned the top few buttons of her blouse.

"Hey." He waved his hand in front of her face. "Hey! Elizabeth! Snap out of it."

She didn't seem to hear him. With a sigh, he pulled the covers up to her chin and left her lying there. She lay there with her eyes shut tight, repeating over and over again that she couldn't breathe. Booker sat down on the carpet with his back against the wall so he could keep an eye on her. Jack sat right next to the bed, whimpering and periodically licking Elizabeth's exposed hand.

It only took her a few minutes to come back to her senses. She stopped mumbling first, and then she sat up, pushing the covers down.

"How did I get here?" she asked.

"I carried you."

"I don't remember that..."

"You had another episode."

"Oh." She fell back against her pillow. "I do remember that. I thought I was going to die."

Booker had been worried too, but he shrugged. "Glad you didn't."

"Did you say my mother died in childbirth from a heart condition?"

"Yeah, that's what I said."

Elizabeth's hand patted her nightstand, seeking out her teacup from the middle of the night. "Is it true?"

"No."

Elizabeth took a sip of the old tea and then made a face. "How _did_ she die, then? Aside from during childbirth?"

"I'll tell you about it some other time, when you're not about to faint from worry."

"It's alright, Booker," she said. "I'm fine now. Please tell me?"

He got up and lay down behind her in the bed, resting his hand on the lower part of her belly. There was a firmness, a _more_-ness, there that he felt stupid for not noticing before.

"When is it coming out?"

"What?"

"That thing inside you."

"Oh." She put her hand on top of his. "The doctor said it would probably be the end of May."

"You were born in April," he said.

"I know."

"The irises were in bloom outside the bedroom window," Booker said. "Your mother said that was a good sign, you being born in spring with the flowers all 'round. She made me pick some and put them in a glass of water so they could be the first thing you saw in the world."

"Really?"

"Yeah. They're not big on men lurking around a lady's room while she's giving birth, or at least they didn't used to be, but she was scared and she didn't have anyone else. Her mother was an old widow, too sick to travel out to New York for your birth. No sisters, no friends, just me. The midwife didn't even get there until an hour before you popped out."

"Is that why she died? Because the midwife wasn't there?"

"Who knows?" Booker shrugged. "I ain't no doctor. I just remember there was a lot of blood. The midwife handed you to me on a towel and said, 'Keep her warm, get her cleaned up.' So that's what I did. I wrapped you up all nice and warm and put you close to my heart, and then I looked back at the bed, and I thought, 'Jesus, there's so much blood.' But I was a nineteen-year-old boy. I told myself that was probably the normal amount." It was like Booker was there again, hearing baby Anna's shrill newborn cry while the midwife frowned at the belly she was squeezing and massaging.

"Booker?"

He was back with Elizabeth again, just like that. "Yeah?"

"Do you think I"m going to die like my mother? In childbirth?"

"I don't know. Doctors and midwives are smarter now, but war can't be good for your chances. I sure wish I hadn't trusted that damned piece of rubber."

"The pessary?" Elizabeth asked. "It's worked well for everyone except us. None of the other women here are in the family way, and they have a lot more sex than I do. I don't know why it failed with us."

"Maybe because we have the worst luck of anyone on the planet," Booker said. "Fuck. I could use some good news, for a change."

"So do you think I should I find someone to end my pregnancy?"

"You kinda missed the boat on that one, Elizabeth. Would've been safer to do that while this was still Paris. I wish you'd gone to the doctor sooner, like back when I first suggested it."

"Yes, well, I didn't," she snapped. "Are you going to whine about the past or help me figure out what to do about the present?"

He rolled onto his back, crossing his arms over his chest. "I don't know what to tell you. Ending it could kill you. Not ending it could kill you. You're pretty much fucked."

"Don't say that!"

"We're all pretty much fucked." He should have been nicer to her in her delicate condition, but he was angry. He was angry at her for not going to the doctor before all hell broke loose, and he was even more angry at himself for not being able to protect her from the Germans, let alone childbirth. "What, your newspapers didn't mention that?"

"Stop it!" Her voice broke. "Stop! We'll be alright! We'll be alright..."

"Stop thinking like a goddamn child, Elizabeth. You're too old and too smart for this optimistic bullshit. There is no happy ending for us. France is fucked, and so is everyone stuck here. Anyone who says otherwise is probably German. But congratulations, you have your precious fucking choices! What'll it be, huh? Rusty metal tools pulling out a half-sized inbred freak now, or rusty metal tools pulling out a full-sized inbred freak later, when it gets stuck on the way out? You'll probably bleed to death whatever you choose, so I'd write that will soon. God knows your whores would sooner tear this place to the ground than share it with each other."

Elizabeth sobs shook the whole bed. Booker ignored her, keeping his arms crossed and a good foot of space between the the two of them. Jack, however, eventually plodded over to Elizabeth and licked the salt off her face.

"Thanks, Jack," she whispered. "You're such a sweet boy. You're my good boy, Jack. God, what am I going to do? How did everything get so awful so fast?"

Booker couldn't bear listening to her cry like that for long. He finally reached out and patted her arm. "Come on, don't cry. We'll find a doctor to take care of this. We're in a house full of prostitutes- someone will know a good doctor who can fix things."

"Don't touch me," she said. Her voice was so dangerously quiet that she might have just told him her arm was made out of venomous snakes, for as fast as he pulled away from her. Jack growled his support, but Elizabeth was scary enough on her own just then.

"What?" Booker asked. "I was trying to be nice."

"Why? So I'll do as I'm told, like a good little pet? You just assume I want to have an abortion. Maybe I don't want that. Maybe I don't even know what I want yet." She tucked the blanket underneath her so she didn't have to share her warmth with him. "What I do know is that I narrowly avoided being raped again a few minutes ago, that I have to keep living with the person who just tried to rape me, that I feel miserable in every sense of the word, and that the one person who's supposed to be on my side for all of this is shooting me in every single vulnerable place he knows to attack. You don't _have_ to stay with me if you disagree so vehemently with the way I choose to live my life, but I sure as hell won't allow you to stay if you try to manipulate me like Comstock did."

"Comstock? Are you really gonna be so irrational as to compare me to him? Elizabeth-"

"Get out of my bedroom." She pointed to the door. "You don't have to leave the house, at least not yet, but I want you out of the room."

"You're kicking me out?" Booker rolled his eyes. "What, permanently? Should I pack a suitcase?"

"I haven't decided yet. Just go. And tell Marie I need to talk to her, if you run into her."

"Yeah, sure. I'll get right on that. Do you need anything else? A statue of Jack made out of solid gold, maybe?"

Elizabeth didn't answer.

"Fine. I'll go," he muttered.

Booker made plenty of noise as he left: stomping on the floorboards, knocking a pile of books onto the floor, and ultimately slamming the bedroom door. Elizabeth lay in the bed the whole while, torturing him with her silence and stillness. It was only once Booker was in the hallway and Elizabeth locked the door behind him that the panic set in.

She was the lone ace in the otherwise shitty hand life had dealt him. She was the only thing standing between him and the bottle. She made him feel good, happy things that scared the fuck out of him. The thought of losing her made him want to puke or else bang on the bedroom door until she forgave him. He didn't think either one would fix anything, though, not after what he'd said. So instead, he hunted all over the house for Marie.

He finally found her bundled up in the garden with one of her sisters. They were admiring the flowers that were still in bloom.

"Hey," Booker said. "Elizabeth wants you, Marie. She's in bed."

Marie frowned. "Is she ill again?"

Booker wasn't sure how to answer. "Uh, she just wants to talk to you," he said. "I told her I'd tell you."

Marie kissed her little sister on the head. "I'll check on her. Thanks, Booker."

"Checking on" Elizabeth turned out to be a six-hour affair. They refused to unlock the bedroom door until they'd finished their conversation, and Booker wasn't keen on bedding down with the Boches in the sitting room, so he sat against his door and dozed. He yelped and tumbled backward in a sleepy daze when the door finally opened.

"What was that?" Elizabeth called.

"Your husband," Marie replied with a dainty laugh into the back of her hand. "Should I tell him to sleep downstairs?"

"That's okay," Elizabeth said. "He can sleep in here if he can avoid being rude until morning. Thanks, Marie. I mean it- thank you so much."

"Of course. Any time. Good night, both of you." Marie waved to Booker as she strode past him.

Booker picked himself up and tried to keep his eyes open while he dressed for bed. Elizabeth was already in her nightgown, her hair braided to prevent tangles. He settled in next to her but decided not to try to touch her again so soon after their latest argument.

"I'm sorry about what I said earlier." He yawned. "You know I didn't mean it, right?"

"You wouldn't have said it if you didn't mean it at least a little," Elizabeth said. "But I forgive you."

Booker stretched out, accidentally sticking his foot into Jack's side and prompting the dog to scoot toward Elizabeth. "What are you gonna do?"

She inhaled deeply. "I'm going to have this baby. I'm terrified of giving birth, but I'm just as terrified of having an abortion. If I have to go through something painful and difficult, I need there to at least be the remote possibility of something good waiting on the other side. So I'm going to take the risk, and if you don't like it, well... I'll figure out a way to open up a tear to New York for you, and you can be on your merry way."

Booker lay there silently, trying to get his sleepy thoughts together. His first thought was that he ought to get a say in the matter, since it involved him too, or at least his blood. His second was that the only way he could make that happen would be to drag her unconscious body to a doctor and convince them to operate without her consent. He was pretty sure he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he did that, assuming he even managed to pull it off. He sighed.

"Did you and Marie talk about the complicated bloodline issue?"

"No. But Booker, royal families have been inbreeding for centuries, if not longer."

"Yeah, and have you ever noticed all the health problems their kids have?"

"I have. It's a risk I'm willing to take."

"Have you ever even held a baby?"

"I've seen them in person. Sort of."

"Sort of?"

"From a distance."

"Jesus Christ," Booker groaned. "Are you serious right now?"

"Dead serious. I have plenty of time to learn about children. May is months and months away."

"So... there's no talking you out of this?"

"No." She hugged herself. "Nothing you can say will make me change my mind."

Booker believed her. "I guess that's that, then." He yawned and tucked his pillow between his head and his arm. He drifted off almost before he was done yawning.

"Booker?"

He fought his way to the surface of his dreams, confused about how long he'd been asleep. "What?" he asked.

"You're never going to hurt me, right?"

He rubbed his eyes and nose, trying not to grumble about his tiredness. "What do you mean?"

"You frightened me earlier, when I told you to leave and you started slamming things. I have no illusions about you being a pacifist, but I thought-I assumed- you wouldn't hurt me. Was I foolish to believe that? Would you have thrown something at me if I hadn't stayed still in the bed?"

That stung Booker more than an electrocuted skyline. The worst part was that he'd laid under the house not even twelve hours ago and felt smug because he was so good at never making Elizabeth feel afraid or unsafe. He sat up, forgetting about his sleepiness, and stared at her in the lamplight. "Elizabeth, you may be stubborn and frustrating as hell, dangerously idealistic, naive, and maybe a little selfish at times, but for all that, I could never, ever raise my hand-or anything else- against you."

"Because you know I would make you leave?" she asked.

"No. Because the thought of hitting you or throwing something at you makes me sick to my stomach. I'd rather stick a gun in my mouth and pull the trigger."

"Don't do that." She finally closed the distance between the two of them, and her body had never felt so good next to his. "Just don't hit me or throw things at me," she said. "And I'd appreciate if you didn't treat the doors and books with violence, either. Since I can't read your mind, I have no idea whether you intend to stop with abusing my personal belongings or move onto me next."

"Then I promise not to hurt the books ever again."

He must have looked downright penitent, because she smiled and rubbed the stubble on his chin.

"I believe you," she said. "You don't tend to break your promises. Not the ones you make to me, anyway."

"I ain't that stupid." He took her hand and laid kisses all over her fingers. "So."

"So?"

"So, we're gonna have a baby." Booker wasn't all that excited about the news, but if there was no use in arguing with Elizabeth anymore (and there wasn't), then he wanted to be on good terms with her again. "It's been a while for me. I don't know if I'll remember what to do."

"I know, I have so many books to read," Elizabeth said. She wiped her hands on the sheet. "God, this is really happening..."

"Yeah, but like you said, you've got plenty of time to figure it out." Booker's eyes were burning, so he closed them and stretched out again.

Elizabeth turned out the lamp and then scuttled around in the bed. "Marie pointed out that I can always abandon the baby at an orphanage if I decide later that I'm not meant to be a mother. And I know she's right, but I don't know if I could do it." She warmed his side, resting her head on his shoulder. "Booker, tell me I'll make a good mother."

"I don't really know the definition of a 'good mother,'" he said.

"It's a good thing I didn't ask you for the definition, then," she said. "Please, Booker?"

"You'll make a great mother," he assured her, rubbing her outside arm. And she probably would make a great mother, but hopefully someone would let her borrow a kid to practice on before that happened.

Elizabeth rubbed her hand up and down Booker's hairy chest, apparently satisfied. "We'll figure everything out in the morning," she promised with a yawn of her own.

Jack echoed her yawn from the foot of the bed, his tail wagging gently against Booker's foot.


	5. Chapter 5

Booker and Elizabeth didn't figure everything out the next morning, nor any morning over the next month. Booker didn't mind, though. Elizabeth's stomach settled down soon after, and her appetite not only returned, but brought some appetite friends as well. The result was that she ate more than Booker and looked less pale and sickly with every passing day.

The Sunday before Christmas, Booker snuck out to his work shed during one of Elizabeth's increasingly rare naps. Since the Germans hadn't thought to "requisition" all the spare lumber he'd tossed in the shed after he'd first fixed the brothel up, he'd used it to build furniture for Elizabeth's nursery. The crib and chest-of-drawers were sitting finished, and the rocking chair would've been done already if Booker hadn't decided to do something fancy and unusual with it. But, he reasoned as he attached the last pieces and sanded them down, finishing five days before Christmas was still pretty good. With a little luck, Marie would finish the sewing projects she'd offered to contribute, and Elizabeth would have the best damn nursery in France, not to mention the best damn Christmas.

Elizabeth was still sleeping when Booker got back inside, so he washed up and then slipped into the bed to warm up. She was curled up on her side, smiling in her sleep. Booker pulled the quilts up to his nose. In the past few weeks, her belly had gone from practically flat to unmistakably pregnant. He didn't think she'd adjusted to the new shape yet, but she'd taken to cradling and patting the bulge under her blouse instead of bumping it into people by accident, so that was progress. He tucked his frozen, socked feet between her warm ankles.

She groaned in her sleep, and Booker was worried for a second that he'd woken her up. Her breathing quickened, and she adjusted her legs several times. It sure didn't sound like she was anxious or uncomfortable, though.

He kissed the corner of her mouth and swept her hair out of her face. "What are you dreaming about, Elizabeth?" he asked.

She opened her eyes and blinked a few times. "So many women," she murmured. "We were all naked in a big pool of warm water, kissing each other... oh, God... I need you, Booker. Right now..."

His hand found its way under her nightgown, between her hot legs. She was slick all over. "No kidding," he said. If her doctor hadn't ordered her to avoid sex, he would have already been on top of her. "Do you want me to touch you while you think about that dream some more?"

She nodded. Booker's fingers caressed up and down her sweet spot, just the way she liked it. He could always tell from the way her muscles tightened if he was doing it right. He kept his touch light- he'd learned it was better to tease than to overwhelm her nerves.

"Tell me more about the dream," he coaxed her after a few minutes.

"Just lots of women I've never met before," she said. "Touching my hair, licking me, making me lick them... Don't laugh, but I was suckling one of the women's nipples. It was so arousing to me..."

He unbuttoned her nightgown until her breasts were exposed. They'd swollen too, although not as much as her belly. Booker sucked gently on one of her enlarged nipples, and the effect was like he'd hit her with a jolt of Shock Jockey. Her back arched, her mouth gaped, and then she twitched and spasmed beautiful. His fingers rubbed her pulsing clit until she finally went limp.

When he turned back to her, she had a funny look on her face, and her hand was resting on her stomach.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"My stomach keeps tightening and relaxing," she said. "It feels odd."

"Does it hurt?"

She shook her head. "Just odd," she said.

"It's probably nothing, then," Booker said. "Lie comfy for a while anyway, just in case. Do you need anything?"

"Breakfast," she said. "Lots of breakfast, please."

"I'll see what I can do." He kissed her.

Booker washed his hands and then fumbled his way around the kitchen. He managed to assemble stale bread, one fried egg, watery porridge, and a pot of tea. It wasn't much to look at, but he knew it was better than what most Parisians were eating.

When he got back to the room, Elizabeth was crying quietly into the blankets.

"What's the matter?" Booker demanded, setting the tray on the bedside table. "Is something wrong with the baby? Are you hurting?"

She shook her head.

"What, then?" he asked.

"You'll laugh at me if I tell you."

His shoulders relaxed a little. "Good. I could use a laugh."

_"Booker!"_

"Fine, I promise not to laugh."

She took a deep breath, wiped her eyes, and then said very seriously, "I want lemon pie so badly I could literally die."

He chuckled at that, which made Elizabeth burst into tears again. He quickly grabbed her and patted her back, mostly so she couldn't see the uncontrollable grin on his face.

"I can't stop imagining the way it would taste on my tongue or the way the crust would flake! I _need_ lemon pie, Booker. I need lemon pie and a huge chunk of Roquefort cheese."

"At the same time?" Booker asked.

"Yes! I want melted Roquefort on top of a slice of lemon pie." She wept into his shoulder. "I would literally kill a room full of innocent people if it meant I could eat that."

"You can leave the slaughter of innocent people to me," Booker said, massaging her back. The bones in her spine and shoulders hurt his fingers, and he realized she seemed even smaller in his arms than usual. The grin finally disappeared from his face. It wasn't the lack of pie she was crying over, not really; it was the lack of nutritious food in general.

Elizabeth eventually regained her composure and sat up straight, wiping her face on her sleeve. "Sorry," she said. "I know it's a silly thing to cry over. It feels like I just need all these frivolous things so desperately, and I can't have any of them."

"Yeah, crying about food during a famine." Booker took the bread from the tray. "Very silly. Here, I know it's not much, but maybe this will tide you over."

She ate her breakfast without complaints. "Did my mother have these desperate needs for certain foods when she was carrying me?" she asked between bites of porridge.

Booker was less than thrilled to answer more questions about his wife's own birth, but he answered anyway. "They weren't exactly in vogue at the time, but yeah, she had them."

"What do you mean? It wasn't in vogue?"

"Apparently it was 'vulgar' to want certain foods, back when you were in the womb."

Elizabeth scraped her spoon against the side of the bowl. "I think if someone told me right now that these longings were vulgar, I would hit them in the face and then start crying again."

"That was pretty much your mother's reaction when I couldn't find any cakes for her. I'd take it as a kindness if you didn't follow her example."

"I'm not making any promises," Elizabeth teased. "Growing a baby is hard, hungry work. I never imagined it would be like this."

By the time she'd licked her plate clean and finished off the tea, she declared that she was ready to tackle her chores. Booker kept an eye on her while he dusted the ceilings and she washed the dishes. When he caught her shifting from foot to foot and rubbing her arched back with her raisiny fingers, he pulled her away from the sink and sat her down on the sofa.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"You looked uncomfortable." Booker pulled off her shoes. "Just sit back and let me do the 'good husband' thing."

He massaged her swollen feet, and she threw her head back and made near-orgasmic noises of appreciation.

"I didn't realize how much my feet hurt until you started," she said. "How could you possibly have known?"

"This isn't my first time around," he reminded her. "I already learned some things the hard way, last time I had a pregnant wife."

Marie turned the corner, nearly giving Booker a heart attack. "I never knew you were a father before," she said.

"For a little bit," he answered, his heart still racing.

"Booker's first wife died in childbirth," Elizabeth said. Her face had gone as pink as Booker's felt.

"Just like your mother?" Marie looked from Booker to Elizabeth and then back at Booker, her eyes narrowing just enough to make Booker wish he could hide the nose he shared with Elizabeth. But that was ridiculous. There was no way Marie could guess something like that. He didn't think so, at least.

"Yes," Elizabeth said. "Childbirth is so dangerous. I'm a little frightened of it."

Whatever Marie was thinking cleared off her face at that. "Oh, no! Don't be frightened, ma belle! I've helped deliver most of my siblings since I was a small child. My mother never died from any of them. I'm sure you will be fine."

"But even if I survive, I'm afraid of the pain," Elizabeth admitted.

Marie waved her hand. "Chloroform! All the posh ladies use chloroform now, and you are very posh. It's good enough for the Queen of England!"

"You don't think it might be hard to come by, what with the war and all?" Booker asked.

Marie frowned. "I forgot about the war for a moment. If I come by any chloroform, I will hide it away for you, Elizabeth. Don't you worry about a thing."

Booker started to ask where she would acquire chloroform from, and then thought better of it. The less any of them knew about each others' wartime survival secrets, the safer those secrets were.

"How are Chloe and Claire?" Elizabeth asked Marie.

"The same as usual," Marie said. "Homesick."

"I hope they like their presents." Elizabeth lowered her voice. "I'm nervous they'll think it's too childish."

"They've grown up quite a lot these few weeks," Marie said. "They'll be pleased to be children again for a little bit. In fact, so will I! They'll be lucky if I don't steal their presents for myself. I never quite had a chance to play with dolls."

Unbeknownst to Chloe and Claire, their older sister had bought each of them a pretty little doll for Christmas, and then she and Elizabeth had conspired together to sew a half dozen doll outfits. And unbeknownst to Marie, Elizabeth had bought a third doll and sewn extra outfits for it. It might have seemed odd to an outsider, but Booker knew Marie wasn't kidding about never having played with dolls. She'd taken on all the household chores and child-rearing duties before the age most kids learned how to read, and then she'd started renting out her body before the age most girls learned what sex was. If any grown woman deserved a doll for Christmas, it was probably Marie.

Booker heard whining and door scratches coming from the upstairs bedroom. "I think Jack could use some play," he said. "Does anyone want to come outside with me?"

Elizabeth and Marie raised their hands.

It was snowing outside, so they bundled up and pulled hats on before venturing out with Jack. Elizabeth's dog ran circles near the fenced-in perimeter, discovered a worn-out rubber ball, and came running back to his humans to show them.

"What a good boy!" Elizabeth rubbed Jack's ears. "Look what you found! Maybe Daddy will throw it for you. Go ask him."

Jack ran over to Booker, who threw the old rubber ball around the yard. Jack always darted immediately after the ball, and Elizabeth and Marie laughed and laughed at the Pit Bull's antics.

"Look at the way his whole body goes crazy when you finally throw it for him," Elizabeth giggled. "He must be the cutest dog in the entire world! Oh, silly dog! You forgot to bring the ball back!"

Jack ran over without the ball, his whole body wagging.

"I need the ball," Booker said. "I can't throw it if it's over there."

Jack stared up at him, tongue wagging out of his mouth.

Booker pointed toward the ball, which was resting on the other side of the yard. "Oh, come on, Jack. Would you kindly go get your damn ball for me?"

The dog trotted over to the ball and picked it up with his mouth. He brought it to Elizabeth and dropped it in her lap. She pitched it as far into the yard as she could. Jack ran over to the ball, sniffed the ground, and then threw himself onto his back and rolled around in the snow.

"Look at him!" Elizabeth doubled over in laughter. "I think he loves the snow. This dog-" She suddenly stopped laughing, pressing both hands over her stomach. "Oh, wow," she said.

"Are you feeling well?" Marie asked.

"Give me your hands," Elizabeth said. "Hurry, let me have your hands!"

Booker and Marie both offered a hand to Elizabeth. She pressed their palms over her stomach and then held as still as she could.

"Can you both feel that?" she asked. "Does that feel like the baby kicking around, or am I imagining things?"

Sure enough, there was a gentle pat, pat, pat against Booker's hand. It made him feel a little sick to his stomach to imagine a tiny creature moving around inside one of Elizabeth's internal organs, but he wore his best poker face. As soon as Elizabeth let go of his hand, he pulled it away and stuck it in his pocket. Elizabeth was too busy squealing with Marie about the baby finally being "alive" to notice his discomfort, and that suited Booker just fine. He wasn't crazy about the impending addition to their family, but he was crazy about his wife. When she was beaming like that, he felt like everything in the world was pretty good.

While they were lying in bed together that night, Elizabeth kept pressing her hands into her stomach and singing little nonsense songs under her breath.

_"In the house of upside down_

_Cellar's top floor, attic's ground._

_In the house of upside down_

_Laughing cries and smile's frown._

_In the house of upside down_

_Found is lost and lost is found..._"

"What are you doing?" Booker asked, tossing the useless newspaper by Jack's bed.

"When I push in, sometimes the baby kicks back a little," she said. "And I think it dances when I sing! Isn't that strange? Do you want to try?"

"No thanks." Booker turned over and draped his leg over hers. "Feeling it move around inside you gives me the creeps, and that song isn't helping."

Shit. From the look she gave him, he knew that was the wrong thing to say.

"I just meant..." Booker scratched his head. "Uhh..."

"You just meant that you don't want to have anything to do with the baby, is that it?" Elizabeth glared at him. "It 'gives you the creeps'? If you're still so opposed to being a father, why are you still here? Just leave already! It's going to hurt all of us so much worse in the long run if you drag it out. I can take care of myself, Booker. I have my business and my friends and my ability to open tears. Just _go_ if you hate the idea of us having a baby so much, you fucking coward!"

"I'm not going anywhere." He rubbed his forehead. "Goddammit, Elizabeth. Why do we have to fight over everything lately? I don't hate the idea of us having a baby. I just don't want to poke my hand around inside your belly to feel it. I'll hold it when it's out of you and cleaned up and shit. Jesus, all I said was that I didn't want to feel it kick! How did you get from that to the conclusion that I would run out on your pregnant ass in a second if I wasn't too chicken?"

"This is a huge commitment!" Elizabeth squirmed out from under his leg. "It scares me that you don't want to be involved with the baby. We're committing to a decade and a half of work, maybe more. You need to take this seriously! You need to get comfortable with the baby! This is probably the biggest, scariest, most serious, most permanent commitment of our entire life... If we make a mistake... no, we_ can't_ make any mistakes... we can't make any mistakes..."

Booker almost tossed some stupid retort back at her. But, luckily, as he opened his mouth, he noticed that she had her usual pre-episode look on her face and that she was starting to hyperventilate again. "Hey, it's okay," he said in his gentlest voice. "Shh, Elizabeth. Just breathe normal, okay? Easy does it." He took her hand and kissed it until all her muscles finally relaxed.

"Sorry," she said.

"It's fine. I'm guessing that little speech was as much for you as it was for me?"

She nodded. "I'm so scared, Booker. What if I'm not ready to be a mother? Books can only teach you so much..."

"You're gonna be a wonderful mother," Booker said. He really meant it this time. "Look, Elizabeth, do you think the Indians and old-timey folks had books to tell them how to raise babies? New mothers get taught how to take care of their babies by other women who know what they're doing. You got a whole house full of women, half of which have either birthed or cared for babies. You're gonna be fine."

"But what if I make some horrible mistake?"

He rolled his eyes. "As a former father, I'll tell you the entire fucking book on taking care of babies. Here goes, you listening? The baby cries, you either need to feed it, clean it, or rock it. Beyond that, as long as you don't drop the baby, poison the baby, or sell the baby, you're probably okay." He tipped her chin up with his thumb. "And hey, some parents fuck up bad, like selling their kid to strange men, but seems like that kid grew up decently."

He'd been hoping for at least a little laugh, but instead she went all quiet on him. He reached behind her neck and massaged it gently. "Elizabeth?"

"You would never go away, right?" she asked. "You would never leave and not tell me where you were going? Even if you were upset that I'm having this baby against your wishes?"

"If you really think I would disappear on you, especially while you're carrying my child, you're not half as smart as I thought. Ain't nothing in the world could make me abandon you, Elizabeth. Not if I get half a say in it."

"You promise?"

"I promised it before, and I'll promise it again, since your fancy ring is put up for safekeeping." He took her left hand and kissed where her wedding ring had been. "You're stuck with me 'til one of us dies, or until you decide to run off with someone younger and smarter and better at making you happy... whichever comes first."

She put her hands on his cheek and held him still while she kissed him. "I wouldn't keep your company if you didn't make me happy," she said. "I'm not that kind of girl."

"Glad to hear it," he said. "And stop fretting over me not wanting this baby. I may not be real excited about it yet, but I'll be a good father. I've got a lot to make up for, and I intend to be the best damn father I can be. You don't need to worry. Now stop playing with your belly and get some sleep."

She fell asleep with her hands clenched around her undershirt, as if she was afraid he might get out of bed and never come back. He rubbed her arms while she snoozed, afraid her fingers would be sore the next day. When he woke the next morning, she was still hanging onto him, and Jack was sleeping in the warm space between her feet.


	6. Chapter 6

Elizabeth woke up still lamenting her lack of lemon pie and Roquefort cheese.

"There's bound to be some _somewhere_ in the city," she said, scritching Jack behind the ears. "Maybe there's some on the black market. Where is the black market? Is it an actual market?"

"If you can hold out until the day after Christmas, prices will be better," Booker cautioned her, pulling on his socks. "Everyone is going to want the best food they can buy for the holiday, but come the 26th, you'll have your pick of pies, I bet."

"I bet you're right," she sighed. "I'll try to manage without my Roquefort lemon pie for a few more days. Wait, I could open up a tear!"

"Yeah, and then you could bleed to death out your nose," Booker reminded her. "No frivolous tears, remember?"

"I'd hardly call this frivolous," Elizabeth protested, but then she sighed. "You're right, though. I shouldn't risk it."

"We'll bake you your pie before the new year." He leaned in and kissed her cheek. "What's more, I bet everyone will be extra nice and let you eat the whole thing yourself. I mean, much as we'd all hate to miss out on Roquefort and lemon pie together, no one wants to cross the emotional pregnant lady."

She tossed a pillow at him, prompting Jack to go crazy and chase the pillow all the way to the floor. Booker returned both to their owner and kissed Elizabeth again, this time on the mouth.

"Behave yourself while I'm out," he said.

She grabbed his collar and smirked. "Never." She stole several extra kisses from him.

"Okay, well, if you can settle for not murdering people for cheese, I'd be much obliged," Booker said.

"I'll try my hardest." She released his shirt and smoothed out the wrinkles. "Be safe."

Booker passed a gussied-up Marie on his way out the door. He raised an eyebrow at her, and she gave a furtive nod. Operation Surprise-Elizabeth-with-Pie was a go.

For his part of the operation, Booker trekked to the dairy shop and loitered out back until the customers cleared out and the owner joined him.

"Roquefort," Booker said, flashing the boxes of cigarettes he'd lifted off the soldiers who'd taken over Elizabeth's house.

The owner disappeared into the house and returned with a hunk of cheese that was smaller than expected. Booker scowled. From the gestures and a few of the words Booker understood, he gathered that that was the last bit of Roquefort the dairy man had. It would have to do. Booker tossed over two of the boxes of cigarettes and kept the third for a rainy day.

There was a commotion in the kitchen when Booker walked into the brothel. He slipped into the back of the crowd and tried to peer over the other heads. Elizabeth seemed to be at the center of the commotion. Two soldiers were restraining her while a third-Adler, Booker realized- stomped around the kitchen.

"No, please don't hurt him!" Elizabeth sobbed. "It was my fault for not closing the door properly! It'll never happen again. He was only trying to protect me! Please don't, please, no-"

Hauptmann Adler kicked something on the ground, and there was a horrible yelp of pain from Jack. Elizabeth screamed.

Booker pushed his way over to his wife. "What happened?" he demanded.

"Booker, make him stop!" Elizabeth stretched her arm out towards her dog, tears running down her cheeks. "Don't let him kill him! Oh, please, no!"

"What happened?" Booker repeated. His eyes swept over the scene, trying to make sense of it. Adler's arm was dripping blood onto the kitchen floor. A pot was boiling over on the stove, dripping foamy bubbles onto the flames. Red, shiny blisters were forming on the back of Elizabeth's hand.

"Damn mutt!" Adler kicked Jack again. "I'll make an example of you."

"Whoa, hey," Booker stepped forward, his hands raised. "Is that really necessary? You already beat the shit out of him. He's gonna be too scared to mess with you ever again."

Adler punched Booker square in the cheek. "Stand down! I am protecting the women here, since you are too much of a coward to do it. Dogs who attack humans must be put down. Do you want this brute biting your little wife next?"

Booker wasn't used to taking a punch without giving one back, but he spat out blood and stepped back reluctantly. "All you're doing for the women is scaring them," he said. "We'll keep the dog put up better from now on. He wouldn't bite anyone without a good reason. Let us get the dog out of your sight, okay?"

Adler pulled his gun out and aimed it at Booker. "I said to stand down!"

Booker put his hands up. The gun shifted away from him to the bloody, shivering brown-and-white speckled dog.

"No, no!" Elizabeth shrieked. "Hauptmann- Harry, please, _bitte_, don't do this! Please, please don't hurt him!"

Booker tried to cover Elizabeth's eyes without much success. The gunshot echoed through the room like an explosion. The soldiers released Elizabeth, and she collapsed onto her hands and knees, seemingly stunned into silence.

"Throw him on the burn pile," Adler said, lighting a cigarette. "And someone bring me a beer. Do you whores know how to clean and bandage a dog bite? Good. Bring the bandages over ot my chair, then."

The crowd started to thin out. In a matter of seconds, Elizabeth went from shaking on the floor to jumping onto her feet and running. Booker froze in panic for a second, thinking she'd gone to beat the shit out of Adler, but she fled up the stairs instead. He hid the cheese in the ice box and then followed after her.

It took a while, but he eventually found her under the bed. He crawled on his elbows underneath the metal frame and plucked the wet hair strands away from her face.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"No!" she wailed. "I'm not okay and I don't think I ever will be again!"

"Shh." He cupped her cheek in his hand. "Don't talk like that. Things will get better."

"I need to undo it," she wept. "I made a mistake. I want to throw away the whole thing and start over."

"What are you talking about?"

"I should have let you take me to New York. I should have made you pull out every time we made love. I should have gone to the doctor sooner, and I should have ended this pregnancy before everything got complicated. I should have kept a better eye on Jack-" At the mention of her dog's name, she cried so hard her shoulders shook. "I changed my mind. I changed my mind! I don't want to give birth. I don't want to have a child. I'm not ready! I'm not ready to protect anyone else from this awful world! I want all of this to go away! Please, Booker, please..."

It was easy for Booker to forget sometimes, with as mature as his wife acted most of the time, that she wasn't even twenty-three yet. He scooted as close to her as he could.

"I don't know how to fix this," he said. "Tell me how to make it better. What do you need?"

"Nothing! Everything! I don't know!"

"I'll see what I can do about that," Booker said dryly. After a few moments of listening to her cry, he said, "Elizabeth, what happened while I was gone? How did things get out of hand like that?"

"I let Jack outside," she said between hiccups. "I was going to let him play while I started lunch. I must not have shut the door tight. I kept checking on him and he was just running around, barking at birds, being his usual cute self." She took a few minutes to cry again, and Booker waited patiently for her to regain control of her voice. "Hauptmann Adler came home for lunch and he was... excited about you being gone. He pushed me against the counter and kissed me in his usual manner. I thought I felt an episode coming on, so I tried to push him off, politely, and he grabbed my hands and held them out of the way. But he accidentally held one of my hands into the side of the pot." She showed him the shiny burn on the back of her hand. "I screamed from the pain, and Jack burst through the door, snarling and barking. He knocked Adler over and latched onto his arm. He was just trying to protect me, Booker. I should have shut the door properly! It's all my fault. I can't even keep my dog alive and my employees safe! Jack... Jack..."

Booker grabbed a first aid kit and dabbed salve on Elizabeth's burn while she grieved over her dog. He was wrapping her hand in a bandage when someone knocked on the bedroom door.

"It's me," Marie's voice said. "May I come in?"

"Yeah," Booker called. "It's open."

The door opened and then clicked shut. "Booker?" Marie asked. "What are you looking for?"

"Elizabeth," he said.

Her face appeared under the other side of the bed a moment later. "Oh, Elizabeth," she said. "What's going on? Are we hiding from something?" Her long fingers dabbed the tears from Elizabeth's face. "What's the matter, _chérie_?"

Elizabeth drew in a shuddering breath. "I don't care to talk about it anymore," she said. "Booker can tell you."

"Adler shot Jack," Booker said.

When Elizabeth cried harder, he realized he probably should've waited to talk about it until he and Marie were outside.

"What?!" Marie's mouth fell open. "No!" She dropped profanities in French and English like cussing was going out of style.

"That was my reaction, too," Booker said.

"This is unacceptable!" Marie ranted. "They march into our home, they push us around, they give us orders in the bedroom, and now they kill our pets? Aren't there laws against this sort of thing?"

Booker didn't know, and Elizabeth was too distraught to answer. In the end, Booker and Marie each held one of Elizabeth's hands while she hiccuped and hyperventilated her way into some sort of trance. Booker wasn't sure if she could hear them, but he wasn't about to leave her alone, so he cleared his throat to get Marie's attention.

"So. Was your trip successful?"

"It was! I convinced Monsieur Thomas to bake and then give me an entire pie."

"Really?" Booker asked. "How'd you manage that?"

"Oh, you do not want to know what I had to do to get this pie," Marie said. "Or maybe you do. You men are all so strange. Anyway, that is a story for another time. Do we have the Roquefort to put on top of the pie?"

"Sure do," Booker said. "It's in the icebox."

"When Elizabeth is feeling better, we'll make her eat some pie," Marie said. "If she eats it now, she'll always feel sad when she eats it and it will never satisfy her. We'll feed it to her later."

"Sounds good." Booker kissed his wife's hand. "Listen, Marie, I want to go give this soldier a piece of my mind. Will you stay here with Elizabeth until I get back?"

"Of course," Marie said. "Just please check on my sisters, when you have a chance."

"You got it."

Booker lurked in the kitchen until it emptied out. He grabbed his sky hook out of the weapons cache and gave it a few practice spins. In addition to being the most intimidating weapon he had, he wouldn't have to waste his precious ammo showing it off.

He found Adler with two of Elizabeth's girls in the sitting room. "Ladies," Booker nodded at them. "Might be best if you two headed to bed now."

They took one look at the weapon on his arm and hastened out of the room.

"What are you doing?" Adler demanded.

Booker punched him in the gut with the sky hook. "You have no fucking clue who I am, do you?" he growled. "You have no clue who you're messing with."

Adler wheezed and clutched his belly. Booker knocked him in the kidneys.

"I might not be able to take a whole army, but I could take you," Booker continued, keeping his voice low. "I know how to do things we ain't got the words to describe yet, and I know how to put you places where ain't nobody gonna find you. I can even lop off one or two unnecessary body parts, and no one but you and the whores would be any the wiser for it. You touch my wife again, you touch anybody or anything she cares about, and I won't give you a nice little warning next time. You understand me, Fritz?"

Adler just stared at him in horror.

"I'm gonna take that as a yes," Booker said. "Good answer, pal. Now get the fuck out of my sight."

The soldier took off without so much as a glance over his shoulder. Booker returned his Sky Hook to its hiding place.

On the way back to his room, Booker peeked into Claire's room. The bed was empty. With a frown, Booker cracked open the door to Chloe's room and found two blond heads snug between the quilt and the pillow. Marie was just leaving the master bedroom when Booker got there.

"She's sleeping," Marie said. "She said she wanted to sleep, so I helped her take her sedative. It won't hurt the baby, will it?"

"Can't imagine the doctor would've given it to her if it would," Booker assured Marie. "Thanks for looking after her."

"It was no trouble," Marie assured him. "She's dear to my heart."

"Same here," Booker said. "And your sisters are fine, by the by. Both sleeping in Chloe's room."

"Thank you." She leaned up to kiss his nose. "I'd like to tuck them in. Good night, Booker."

Elizabeth didn't even stir when Booker scooted in next to her. Her face was still wet from her tears. Booker wiped it dry with the bed sheet and kissed her cold, flower-scented hair.

"You sleep easy now," he said, tucking the blanket up to her neck. "I ain't about to let anything else bad happen to you, Elizabeth."

She didn't stir from her drugged slumber. Booker stuck his icy feet under hers to warm them up, but her toes were nearly as frozen as his. Her damn dog had always kept their feet nice and toasty at night. Booker grimaced. He was gonna miss that mutt nearly as bad as Elizabeth would.


	7. Chapter 7

Two mornings later, Elizabeth shook Booker awake for a surprise roll call. He quickly lathered soap onto his face and shaved while she braided her hair at her vanity.

"What do you think this is about?" Booker asked, stifling a yawn.

"It's the day before Christmas Eve," Elizabeth said. "They're either going to try to win us over by making minor good news seem like salvation, or else they're going to crush our spirits entirely. Or both, I suppose."

"Well, that pretty much covers all the options, don't it?" Booker dipped his razor in the sink full of hot water. "Maybe they just want to apologize for any pets killed in the last two days."

He could practically hear Elizabeth rolling her eyes at him.

"And yet I'm the naive optimist in this relationship..."

They left their room at the same time as Marie, her sisters, and another whore named Colette, so the six of them walked to the street together. Roll call was divided by neighborhood, meaning they only had to go through a few thousand names rather than several million. Even so, that was still a lot-physically and mentally- for Elizabeth to stand through. It probably didn't help that most of their neighbors gave the "collaborators" of_ l'Oiseau Chanteur_ plenty of room.

After a couple of hours of making sure every member of every household was accounted for, the Germans made a speech of some kind. Elizabeth whispered translations under her breath. When she got lost or needed to catch her breath, Marie supplemented. It was mundane stuff, like the curfew being moved to six o' clock and residents needing to sweep the streets in front of their homes. And then-

"'Additionally, the following unemployed men will be relocated and assigned work for the good of their new nation.'"

"'Assigned work?'" Booker whispered.

"Shh!" Elizabeth's little hand was so tight on his wrist that Booker worried she might break it. "Listen."

Booker listened. They were calling out names again, but a lot faster than before. He was pretty sure they wouldn't mess with an American, but he listened to put Elizabeth's mind at ease.

"Joseph Danvers; Philippe Devereux; Booker DeWitt; Pierre Douay-"

Booker stood there, too stunned to move for a minute.

"I told you it would happen in France," Elizabeth said, and then her knees buckled and she fainted straight into Marie's back.

"Yeah, you were right," Booker muttered as he helped Marie guide Elizabeth's body to the ground. "You always are."

Marie continued the translation while she fanned Elizabeth's face. "'These volunteers will assemble in this same spot at five o' clock tonight for relocation,'" she whispered. "'Any volunteers who refuse to relocate will be executed for treason. In the event that a volunteer cannot be found at five o' clock, their families will be executed and their possessions will be distributed to members of the military. Volunteers need not bring extra shoes or clothing. Weapons and alcohol are not permitted. Thank you, volunteers.'"

Booker wasn't sure the Germans had the same definition of "volunteer" as the rest of the world. By the time Elizabeth came around again, the neighbors were returning back to their homes.

"You okay?" Booker asked.

"A little dizzy," she said. "Did I faint?"

"You did," Marie said. "They shouldn't make pregnant women stand so long."

Elizabeth pressed one hand to her forehead and started to sit up.

"Whoa, hey." Booker rested a hand on her shoulder. "Just lie back for a minute."

"On the cold, wet ground?" Elizabeth rolled her eyes. "No, thank you. I want to go inside and change into something dry before I catch my death."

"Then at least let me carry you," Booker said.

"You'll hurt your back. I can walk."

"I ain't that old yet. Come on, Elizabeth. Might not have another chance to carry you again."

"Oh, fine." She held her arms up. "You can carry me."

He lifted her without much trouble and carried her, bridal style, inside the warm house and up the stairs. He set her down on the bed and pulled clean clothes from her wardrobe and chest-of-drawers.

"Here," he said, placing the clothes on her lap. "Get changed before you get sick."

"Booker, what did you _do_?" Elizabeth demanded, unbuttoning her blouse. "What did you do to make them relocate you, as an American citizen?"

Booker stuck his hands in his pockets. "Huh? I don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't lie to me, Booker," she said. "Hauptmann Adler was acting strange around you all day yesterday. Did you say something to him while I wasn't there? Oh, God, Booker- please tell me you didn't try to fight him!"

"Well, it wasn't a fight, exactly-"

_"Booker!" _

He hung his head. "I'm sorry, okay? I was mad and I didn't think it through. I'm sorry."

"I knew this was all your fault!" She crumpled up her slush-covered blouse and threw it at his face. "How could you be so foolish and reckless, Booker? I needed you, I _still_ need you, and you went and declared a one-man war against the Germans? What am I supposed to do without you? How am I supposed to take care of this baby by myself? I'm too young to be a widow!" She started to cry at that, and it was worse than her being mad at him.

"Look," he said, kneeling down next to the bed and taking her cold hands in his. "I'm sorry, Elizabeth. I know it was stupid. But you're gonna be okay, with or without me."

"Just go," she wept. "I know you've been looking for an excuse to leave me on my own for ages, and you just weren't brave enough to do it yourself. Looks like you found someone to do it for you. I hope it's everything you wanted, Booker."

"I told you, I would _never_ abandon you," Booker said, but he couldn't get properly angry because he was scared that maybe she was a little right. If there was one thing Booker was good at, it was sabotaging his life. He was especially good at sabotaging the parts that affected Elizabeth.

_"Go._"

Booker went. He walked out to his work shed and began hefting the furniture up to Elizabeth's nursery, piece by heavy piece. Marie passed him as he was carrying the chest-of-drawers, and by the time he set the rocking chair down, she was arranging the cushions she'd made onto the furniture.

"Those look great," Booker said. "I think Elizabeth likes purple."

"She does," Marie said. "And from the fabric I had, it was the best choice both for matching the walls and hiding bloodstains."

"Bloodstains?" Booker asked.

"All women bleed," Marie reminded him. "Especially right after they give birth. Sometimes clothes and cushions get ruined. Better to wear a dark color in case the bleeding becomes too heavy for the cloths to handle."

"Oh," Booker said. "Right."

Marie filled the drawers with the diapers and pins and baby clothing, and then she left Booker to rearrange all the furniture into the best position. It all fit just right in the little room. He put some of Elizabeth's favorite books on the little table and then arranged the cushions until it looked nice and comfortable.

"Booker?" Elizabeth called.

"In here."

"I'm sorry about what I said earlier." Her voice got closer to the nursery door. "I know you didn't do anything deliberately. I was just so upset-" The nursery door creaked open. "Oh my God," she breathed. "Booker..."

"Come here." He patted the seat of the rocking chair. "I made it extra short for you. I wanna see if it fits you."

She sat on the cushion, and her little legs reached the floor perfectly. "What is this?" She pointed to the cushioned ledge that protruded out from the side of the chair.

"It's a cradle," Booker explained. "I saw a picture of it somewhere. You're supposed to swaddle the baby up real tight and hold him like this-" He wadded-up a blanket, placed it over Elizabeth's bosom, and then crossed one of her arms over it. "And then once you've rocked him to sleep, you can lay him down next to you..." He laid the blanket on the cushion. "And then you've got your hands free to hold a book or a cup of tea, all while you keep rocking Baby."

"That's amazing, Booker." She clasped her hands together. "I never could have dreamed up anything so clever, much less figured out how to build it."

"I saw it in a magazine somewhere. Oh, but-" He patted the chest of drawers. "We put all your diapers and stuff away for you, too. And look in the crib." He beckoned for her to stand up.

"Ohh, it's beautiful!" Elizabeth rubbed her hands over the soft, puffy yellow blanket.

"Marie made it for you," Booker said. "And all the cushions, too."

Elizabeth stroked her fingers along the smooth wood railing of the crib and then examined her splinter-free digits. "The two of you really did all of this by yourselves?"

"Yeah." Booker was trying hard not to sound boastful, but he didn't think he was succeeding. "Only took about three weeks. I know it's not Christmas yet, but I wanted to see your reaction to it before I left."

Elizabeth sank down in her new chair and buried her face in her hands. The chair rocked a little with every sob that shot through her body.

"Hey." Booker dropped on one knee on the floor. "Hey, I know it's nothin' fancy, but it's a hell of a lot better than what you had when you were a baby. It's not _that_ bad, is it?"

"No, no," Elizabeth laughed through her tears. "This is the best nursery in the entire world. I'm crying because I'm so happy to have it, and because I'm so sad about losing you. I want you to be here when I give birth, and when I figure out how to nurse, and when I don't know what I'm doing at all... I'm so afraid. I don't want you to leave me all alone, Booker."

"You're not gonna be alone." Booker rubbed her arms. "Marie and a whole brothel full of ladies are gonna be here to take care of you."

"But you were the only thing stopping Adler from bothering me at all hours of the night and day. Your presence was what ensured I had a safe room to sleep in at night. When you leave..." She swallowed. "I don't know what will happen."

"Yeah." He sighed. "That makes two of us. But I do know one thing for sure."

"That I'll have lovely furniture in the baby's nursery?"

"I was gonna say that you're gonna be such a great mother that your baby will never be lacking in love or kindness or moralous...ness," Booker said. "Even without me. Hell, he'll probably turn out better without me around. I corrupted you something terrible in the first two months I had you back. If I could turn a Bible-quoting virgin into a stealing, murdering, whoring Madame that fast, it's probably best I don't raise a whole lot of kids."

"Is that why you didn't want me to have this baby?" Elizabeth asked.

"One of the reasons. Guess it doesn't matter now." He stood up and leaned against the wall. "You're gonna be amazing, Elizabeth. You're gonna survive this war, and you're gonna raise a damn fine human being, and you're probably gonna write a memoir that'll outsell the Bible. You're living through history, remember? You're gonna live to a ripe old age, and your children's children's children are gonna beg you for stories about what life was like when Grandpa or Grandma DeWitt was a baby."

A panicked look suddenly stole over Elizabeth's face.

"What's the matter?" Booker asked.

"I don't have any names picked out!" Elizabeth said. "You're about to leave, and I don't know what to call the baby! Quick, Booker- what names do you like?"

"I don't know, Elizabeth. It's your baby. You decide the name."

"But I don't want to name it something you hate!"

"Well, if it's a girl, you should make her middle name Marie," Booker said. "What kind of first names do you like?"

"I like flower names for a girl," she said. "Lily, Rose, names like that."

"Then give the baby a flower name if it's a girl," Booker said. "Just for the love of God, please don't name her Daisy."

"And what if it's a boy?"

"I don't care. Just don't name him after me. Or anyone in Columbia. Name him after a book character, or something."

"Jean Valjean DeWitt?" she teased.

"It's better than Booker Junior, at least."

"I'll figure something out," she said. "But before you go, I have a Christmas present for you, too. It's in the room. Come on."

Once they were locked in their bedroom, she gave him her leather-bound Bible, the one she read when she woke up from nightmares and hugged to her chest when she was afraid. "Open it," she said.

The book fell right open to the Psalms. A photograph lay on top of the open pages. He picked it up and grinned. It was a picture of Elizabeth posing naked on their bed. It was more artistic than obscene, but her naked breasts and half-hidden patch of brown curls still got his blood pumping.

"I think that's called sacrilege," he said. "Storing them in the Good Book like that."

"I think God will forgive me. I had them taken in June, back when we had the money to spare and you could find a photographer. Do you like them?"

"Yeah, they're great." Booker flipped through them. There were nearly a dozen photographs of Elizabeth, both clothed and nude. He looked at the photographs and then back up at her living image. If he didn't know better, he would've thought they were two different people. The girl in the photograph was tiny but looked happy and well-nourished. Her eyes were sparkling, even in the brown-and-white photograph, and her whole face seemed full of laughter and hope. She was smiling in real life, too, but it was the saddest damn smile Booker had ever seen. One bony arm was curled protectively around her stomach. She carried herself like she was exhausted- exhausted, but determined not to go down without some serious fighting. The thought of how much he was gonna miss her hit him all at once, and it hurt so bad he almost yelped. He managed to touch her thin face instead.

"I love you so much," he said.

She wrapped her arms around his waist, resting her head on his chest. "I love you too."

"You're gonna make it," he said into her hair. "If anyone makes it out of this alive, it's gonna be you."

"Are we going to be together again, Booker?" she asked.

He didn't know, so he just kissed her forehead.

She sat him down on the bed and straddled his lap with some effort. "We could make love before you go," she whispered. "I don't think abstinence will be possible for me after you leave. We could make love one last time, since it won't matter in the long run."

The idea of Adler raping Elizabeth's vulnerable, starving, pregnant body definitely put Booker off the idea of sex. He wrapped his arms around her waist, resting his forehead on the ridges in her chest. She stroked his hair the way his mother had done when Booker was little and feverish.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I'm sorry for fucking everything up."

"I won't let anything bad happen to us," Elizabeth said. "I swear, Booker. Just stay strong, and I'll figure something out. Do you trust me?"

"Yeah," he said. "I do."

"Then you don't have to worry about anything." She kissed the top of his head, the way he'd done to her so many times.

Booker covered her skin with a wetness that they both silently pretended was the result of his kisses.


	8. Chapter 8

Booker wasn't sure what the protocol was on giving presents to his wife's friends, but he felt like he ought to give Marie one. And that wasn't just because she'd helped Elizabeth tie Booker up and ride his face a few times. No, he was fairly certain Marie was sort of his friend, too, as long as being friends meant engaging in conversation a few times a week and helping each other out. It was with that in mind that he'd built her a dollhouse out of the smaller pieces leftover from Elizabeth's furniture. He brought the dollhouse to her room and kicked the door, lightly, three times in a row instead of knocking. She opened the door in her dressing gown and stared in confusion at the house in his arms.

"Booker?" She raised an eyebrow. "What is this?"

"It's a dollhouse," Booker said. "Merry Christmas."

"Oh, for my sisters?" she said. "They will love it! Thank you."

"Uh..." Booker paused. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to spoil Elizabeth's Christmas present for Marie. "It's mostly for you. You know... in case you get a doll of your own. But I guess your sisters can play with it until then."

"For me?!" Marie gestured for him to come into her room. "Thank you so much, Booker. I've always wanted a dollhouse!"

"Sure." He set it down on her floor. "Sorry I never got a chance to fix that cracked window for you..."

She waved her hand. "Don't waste time worrying about that. It's fine. I'm sorry you're getting sent away."

"It happens," he said. "I'm sure the Triple Entente guys will bust me out sooner or later."

Marie swore under her breath in French. Booker smirked.

"Yeah, I know the feeling."

"Never mind that." Marie opened her closet and pulled a bundle of fabric down. "I have a present for you as well."

She set the hat on his head. It was a fashionable fedora made of some thick material Booker wasn't familiar with and lined with something smooth and red that he tentatively wanted to call silk. While he was figuring out the hat, she wrapped a scarf around his neck that was as smooth as the lining but a lot thicker than Booker expected. Marie looped it around a few times and then tied it loosely.

"Very handsome," she said with a sad smile, brushing snow off the shoulders of his coat. "I'll miss you, Booker. Thank you for always doing your best to protect us. You've done an excellent job."

Neither of them mentioned it, but they were both wondering what would happen to the ladies in the brothel now that Booker was leaving.

Booker sighed. "Listen, Marie... take good care of Elizabeth for me, will you?"

She hugged him and kissed him on the cheek. "Elizabeth doesn't need anyone to take care of her. But I'll do my best to keep her spirits up. I'm sure you'll be home safely soon."

Booker wasn't so sure. He patted Marie's back and then let go of her. "That's the spirit."

Booker kept his new hat and scarf on, even though he wasn't sure he'd be able to keep them with him in the labor camp. Elizabeth hugged his arm all the way to the assembly plaza.

"I wish we were still running on Paris time," she said. "I need one more hour with you."

"A million more wouldn't be enough," Booker said.

"I know." Elizabeth sniffled.

They stopped near the back of the line, and Booker turned to cup her pretty face in both of his rough hands. "Hey," he said. "You'll be okay. You're smart, and you're good with people. You'll be fine."

"It's not me I'm worried about!" she said with a dainty little glare at him. "You're the one always getting into trouble, Booker!"

He realized just how much he loved her whole face: her mouth, her nose, her forehead, her eyes-God, yes, especially her blue eyes- and how much he loved every single expression she'd ever made, including her current one. He held her head still and kissed every inch of her face. When his chapped lips touched hers, her hands suddenly slid behind his head to keep him there. Booker's mouth frantically told Elizabeth how much he loved her, and how she still made his heart beat too fast, and how he was sorry for bringing this on them. Likewise, Elizabeth's lips and tongue told him that she knew, that she loved him too and would cry over him for months. Booker's mouth listened to hers until someone put their hand on his arm and pulled him away from his wife. His shoes dragged on the cobblestones, as reluctant to go as he was.

Elizabeth watched him board the truck with both gloved hands on her stomach, her face too frozen to tell what she was thinking. As the soldiers latched to back of the truck, Adler all but slithered out of the rest of the crowd and put his arm around Elizabeth's shoulder. He waved at Booker with his other hand. Booker growled and slammed his fists on the back panel of the truck, earning a smashed hand and bloody nose, courtesy of the butt of one of the soldiers' rifles. When he recovered from the pain enough to see clearly again, they were stopping at the train station.

"All aboard!" a German soldier said in a mocking voice and a terrible accent.

Booker finished mopping up the mess from his nose on his red scarf. _Time to take the 6 o' clock train to hell,_ he thought.

They organized the train in alphabetical order, meaning that Booker ended up in a car with a few dozen people he didn't know, and one person he did: Philippe Deveraux from three houses down. Booker didn't know the Deveraux family super well, but he knew Philippe had a wife and two young sons. Booker tucked Elizabeth's leather-bound Bible under his arm and sat down on the bench next to Philippe.

"You okay?" he asked.

Philippe jerked his chin down twice, the kind of nod a person only did when they were struggling to keep it together. Booker could relate. He crossed his arms, hugging Elizabeth's Bible to his chest, and stared at the snow-covered landscape rushing by. They were riding straight into the sunset, and the orange glow was pooling on the snow like blood. Booker opened the Bible, looked down at a clothed picture of Elizabeth, and then looked back out the window across from him.

"Hey." He elbowed Philippe, who was pretending to sleep. "Hey!"

The Frenchman grumbled.

"Look, look at the sun!" Booker said. "We're going west. Why the hell are we going west? Germany is the other direction."

Philippe sat straight up and looked out the window for a moment. Then he slumped back against the vibrating wall of the train and covered his eyes with his hand. He muttered something, and Booker could only catch the words _"première ligne_."

The front line.

"That's what I was afraid of," Booker said. He pulled his new hat down over his eyes and stayed like that for the rest of the journey.


	9. Chapter 9

The train stopped at a station in what Booker decided must be Western France. It seemed abandoned, aside from the prisoners and German troops. The latter shoved the former into new trucks like cows headed for the slaughterhouse. The truck was too crowded for anyone to sit, so Booker clutched Elizabeth's Bible in the crook of his arm and held onto the rail attached to the roof with his spare hand. When they finally stopped moving and the rumble of the truck died down, Booker peered through the slats on the side of the truck into the darkness. It seemed to be raining out there. As they were herded out of the truck, icy droplets stung Booker's neck and hands. He grimaced. Of course it would be sleeting. He pulled his hat down lower and filed into the old school building with the rest of his neighbors.

A bored-looking German soldier at a desk took down Booker's information and then handed him a jumpsuit and a red armband.

"You may keep your personal belongings, but you can't wear them except on Sunday," the soldier recited.

_How generous,_ Booker thought.

"You will perform all duties required of you. You will be paid in camp currency. Camp currency may be used to purchase luxuries such as stationery from the camp shop. Mail is collected and distributed once per week. You may send two letters per month, each no more than four pages long. Punishment for infractions..."

Booker stopped listening. _Letters..._ He was going to be able to write Elizabeth letters. He might even be able to receive letters she wrote back. The fact that he was nearly giddy over that information made him hate the place all the more. But if he was going to die there, maybe he could do it knowing if Elizabeth and her baby were okay.

He followed the rest of the prisoners to a large, open room that was crowded with cots. He claimed a bed near the wall. Reluctantly, he changed into his jumpsuit and red armband and stowed his folded-up clothes, scarf, and hat in the lockbox under his bed. He kept the Bible with him, just in case.

It was "free time" before bed, but half the men who were already there had tucked in early. Booker wandered out to the recreation room, where a handful of men (mostly British and French soldiers, from the looks of it) were reading and playing cards. He spotted a couple of friendly British soldiers he recognized from the brothel and approached their game of poker.

"DeWitt!" said the soldier named Smith. "What brings you to our neck of the woods?"

"Turns out the Krauts get touchy when you threaten to chop off their manhood," Booker said.

A soldier whose name Booker couldn't remember clapped him on the shoulder. "Sorry to hear that, mate. How's the missus, aside from effectively being a widow now?"

"She's okay," Booker said. His throat tightened a little. "She, uh... she's gonna have a baby in the spring. She's real excited about it."

"Christ," an unfamiliar soldier chimed in. "Get the poor bloke a drink already, Winston."

The second soldier poured some clear booze into a tin cup and handed it to Booker. "There ya go. The first night's always the worst. Drink up."

"Thanks." Booker drank it all down at once, grateful to have a manly reason for his watering eyes.

"Miss Elizabeth is tough as nails," the one named Winston said. "She just about hauled me out the front door for smoking indoors once. Anyone who messes with her will be sorry."

"Yeah," Booker said. "She'll make it."

"How's my Marie doing?" Smith asked. "You'd be surprised how much I think about her here."

"Marie is good. Her sisters moved in with us right after the invasion. She's... she's good."

"Good," Smith said. "Good, I worry about her."

"Hey, I thought this was a labor camp," Booker said, eager to change the topic. "When does the labor part happen?"

"Bright and early tomorrow," Winston said. "Digging trenches again. I hear next week we'll finally be doing other tasks. Won't it be fun to build bombs for them to drop on our country?"

Booker's head spun from the liquor. "What's the likelihood of someone dropping bombs on us?" he asked.

"Pretty high," said Smith. "You remember Holmes? That's how he died."

Booker rubbed his chin, which was already going numb. "If anything like that happens to me, one of you better write to Elizabeth and tell her."

"We will," said Winston. "We made a pact to write to each others' families if anything happens. We'll add Miss Elizabeth to the list. Already got the address and everything."

"Much obliged," Booker said.

He dreamt that night that he was following Elizabeth around the brothel. The pipes had all broken, so their feet were covered in water. Every time Booker got close enough touch her, she would run off again. He noticed that she was trying to repair the broken pipes with cheese cloth and hair ribbons.

"It's not going to work," he kept telling her. "The whole place needs new pipes. You can't fix it like that, Elizabeth. Let me fix it for you."

She couldn't seem to hear him. He finally caught up with her and grabbed the wrench out of her hand to work on the repairs. She screamed in pain and fell against the wall, clutching her round belly. Blood rushed down her legs, and the water around their knees turned red and thick.

He woke up covered in icy sweat. Smith and the unnamed soldier from earlier were shaking him, and a few other men were sitting up in their bunks. Booker realized he was still yelling Elizabeth's name and shut his mouth.

"You can't shout like that, mate," Smith said. "You'll get us all shot."

"Sorry," Booker muttered.

A light shone into the room, and the Brits quickly returned to their own beds. A dozen German soldiers marched in, blinding sleepy eyes with their lights. Once they determined that no rioting was going on, they swept out of the room just as quickly as they'd swept in.

Booker lay awake for a long while, worrying about Elizabeth. When he finally fell asleep again, he dreamt of Adler hitting and shoving and doing things to Elizabeth that turned Booker's meager dinner to acid in his stomach. He woke silently that time, thank God. Instead of trying to sleep again, he began composing his first letter to Elizabeth in his head.

_"My Dearest Elizabeth,"_ he'd start it. _"They sent me out East, to the front. Pass it on to the rest of the neighbors, would you? I'm sure they're all worried about their men, too. Conditions aren't too bad, but food seems scarce. We're digging trenches to keep the Krauts safe, can you believe that? Don't worry, though, I'm keeping my head down and doing as I'm told. Hope you're proud._

_"I miss you something fierce, Elizabeth! None of the men here are as fun to kiss as you, and I speak from experience."_ Good, that would make her laugh. _"I can send two letters each month. It'll be a miracle if I can find words to fill up that many. But know that not a single minute passes when you are not on my mind. Please send word from home as often as you can spare the ink. Even if I can't write much, hearing from you would be a godsend. Please also send cookies as often as you can spare the sugar. Give Marie my love, and Smith's. (You remember, that tall soldier who was sweet on her?) Lots of soldiers from your cathouse are here, so I've got plenty of company. Better send enough cookies to share, if you can._

_"Jesus, I miss you so much, Elizabeth..."_

When the morning bell rang, Booker woke up tangled in Marie's scarf and embracing Elizabeth's Bible.


	10. Chapter 10

Booker kept track of the days with tally marks on a blank page near the front of Elizabeth's Bible. He'd written the name of six months on each line: December, January, February, March, April, and May. December only got eight marks, seeing as how he'd started keeping track on December 24th. December was also separated from the rest of the months by a small, centered "1915," just in case he lost track of the year. Underneath May, he'd written "May 18" and circled it three times. From what he remembered, babies weren't real big on following schedules, but if Booker never got the chance to speak to Elizabeth again, he was gonna assume she gave birth to a healthy baby girl on May 18th like she'd figured.

The first twelve tally marks were a blur of soggy dirt and rain so cold it made Booker's bones ache. He shoveled until his arms gave out, and then he thought of Adler pushing Elizabeth up against a wall and bruising her lips with his nasty, smoky, German ones, and Booker shoveled some more. On the thirteenth day, Booker was assigned to kitchen duty. On the fourteenth day, he was assigned to drag bodies from the trenches to the burn pile. And on the fifteenth day, he received a parcel. His British soldier pals crowded around him as he opened it.

"Is it from Miss Elizabeth?" Winston asked.

Booker nodded. He wasn't sure talking was a good idea just then. The package was far messier than Elizabeth would have tolerated, which Booker assumed was connected to the "Inspected by P.A. 930" stamp on the brown paper. Inside, he found four pairs of thick wool socks, two letters on dainty stationery, tins of meat, and, most excitingly, two dozen buttery cookies cushioned by balled-up newspaper. Booker tucked the letter addressed to him inside his jumpsuit and handed the other to Smith.

"For me?" the soldier asked. He sniffed it. "I think it's from Marie!"

"Well, open it up," said the newer soldier, whom the others called Tyler. (Whether Tyler was his first or last name, Booker wasn't sure.)

Smith slid his fork handle into the powder blue envelope and carefully slit it open. Booker nibbled on a cookie and watched Smith unfold the letter inside like it was a million dollar note.

"You gonna read it out loud?" Winston asked.

"Not bloody likely," Smith said. He held it up and began reading with a greedy look on his face.

"Socks for everyone," Booker announced, placing a pair in front of each of the three men. "And the cookies are meant to be shared, too, if I know Elizabeth."

Booker stored the leftover cookies in his lockbox while he worked that day. He pulled a few out that evening, as he was climbing into bed with Elizabeth's letter. The letter was eleven pages long and scented with her perfume. Booker was pretty sure she was trying to talk to him in code in at least a few places, but apparently he was too dumb to figure it out.

_"My bed has been quite cold since you left,"_ she wrote. _"Our baby kicks like crazy when I talk about you; I'm sure I'm not the only one who misses you! The floor is exactly as creaky as you left it. Is the food there salty enough for you? Make sure you're going to Mass every Sunday! Don't share cups or silverware with anyone, and be sure to wash your hands often. Keep your feet dry, Booker."_

Booker puzzled over her words until his brain hurt, and then he tried to picture what the ladies of l'Oiseau Chanteur were doing right then. Elizabeth would be finishing up supper, or maybe she'd be curled up on the sofa by the fire with one of her books. She would go to bed before too long, possibly with Marie, if her bed was really as unbearably cold as the letter had indicated. That thought stirred up memories of Marie and Elizabeth kissing each other, stripped down to just their stockings and garter belts. God, France had been fun while it lasted. Booker took advantage of the empty dormitory and recalled every detail of Elizabeth and Marie on his fortieth birthday. He mopped up the mess with a dirty sock when he was finished and then drifted off.

He dreamt that night that the brothel was fine. Not a single pipe was leaking, and Booker had the feeling that he'd just finished his rounds and everyone was fine. He found himself outside the nursery and pushed the door open.

The walls were radiating with bright yellow sunlight, and Elizabeth was rocking a bundle of yellow blankets with a huge book lying open and face-down on her lap.

"Daddy's home!" Elizabeth cooed at the bundle. She was in a white nightgown with her wavy brown hair flowing over the sleeve. "I told you he would never leave us. Daddy's back to take care of us."

Booker ran to them, and for once he managed to grab hold of Elizabeth. He held her and smelled her hair and kissed her face, unable to believe his good luck.

"Look at our beautiful baby, Booker," Elizabeth said. "Isn't she perfect?"

Booker looked down. The baby looked exactly like Anna, with thick brown hair and wide, curious blue eyes. He took the baby from Elizabeth and kissed its soft little nose.

"I'm here," he said over and over again. "I won't ever leave you again. I'm here. I'm here. I'm-"

The clanging morning bell ripped Booker away from them. He wept silently all the way to roll call, and then a red-hot anger flickered inside him as he stood in the sleet listening for his name. How dare these motherfuckers separate him from Elizabeth? As he chopped firewood that day, he imagined the ax whacking through the spine and sinew of German necks.

The next week's package contained more socks, more cookies, and The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo. Elizabeth's letter was only seven pages long this time, although she begged him six separate times to keep going to Mass each week. He felt a little guilty about not doing what she asked, but if Elizabeth knew how hard they were working him, she would understand why he needed his rest. Besides, he didn't need all the superstition and false hope that came with religion. He finished the book before the next package arrived and loaned the Hugo novel to Tyler.

"Oh yeah, it has a real happy ending," he assured the soldier. "The hunchback lives happily ever after with the gypsy girl."

Tyler returned the book three days later, by way of chucking it near Booker's head. The Charles Dickens books Booker received subsequently experienced a somewhat less airborne existence. Despite the weekly cookie delivery, Booker found his jumpsuit getting looser and looser on his dwindling frame.

The first week of February, there were no socks or books in that week's parcel, just packages of treats from Elizabeth's kitchen and one short letter. The note seemed more strained than usual- Elizabeth usually did a good job of hiding her stress, although Booker wasn't fool enough to believe life in Paris was as smooth as she made it sound. That week, though, her neat handwriting was more of a scrawl.

_"Booker,_

_I hope you and your friends enjoy the cookies. I'm sorry I didn't send anything else; things here are occupying me more than I care to discuss. The baby and I are both doing well. She sends the most cordial of greetings and felicitations to you, if I'm interpreting the morse code she's kicking into my ribs correctly. So many changes are coming so soon! We both have to be ready for them._

_Promise me, Booker, that you'll go to Sunday morning mass this week! Easter is coming up, and it's more important than ever that you go this week, even, no, especially if you're dying! Salvation will come to you during mass, and I will never, ever forgive you if you miss it and are lost forever. GO TO MASS, BOOKER. I'll know if you don't go, and you'll be sorry in more ways than one if you don't."_

"Huh," Booker said. "I guess she wants me to go to mass." It was a little weird how fixated she was on it, especially since he was pretty sure she wasn't even Catholic.

Nonetheless, come Sunday morning, Booker donned his normal clothes (which were now more than a little baggy on him), bundled up with the scarf and hat from Marie, and carried Elizabeth's Bible to mass. He sat in the back and stole glances at the naked pictures tucked in the Psalms. Elizabeth hadn't said nothin' about sacrilege.

The mass was nothing special, but it did make him feel connected to Elizabeth, so he didn't mind it. As the out-of-tune piano began the benediction, explosions shook the wooden floors under Booker's feet. He jumped up with everyone else and ran to the windows. It looked like a squad of rebels had appeared from thin air in front of the chapel. Their skin shimmered and crackled in response to the bullets. Booker rubbed his eyes. Surely they didn't really have electromagnetic shields like his. Right?

Someone kicked the door to the chapel open, and everyone ducked behind pews.

_"Viva la resistance!"_ a tall, skinny Black man shouted. "Anyone interested in a change of scenery? Come this way! Simply show the nice lady your right hand as you leave. Hurry, now!"

Booker's entire body tensed. Would they give him trouble over the brand? Maybe he could jump out the window, but everyone was shoving him toward the front door-

"Go," the tall Black woman said with each hand she glanced at. "Go, go, go."

Booker tried to sneak out of the back, but the Black man grabbed his right hand with surprising strength.

"Here!" he shouted. "A.D.! He's here!"

Three other rebels, all wearing black clothing and a ton of guns and explosives, crowded around Booker. "This way, Mr. DeWitt!" said a teenage girl, shorter than even Elizabeth. "You stay close to us, please! We'll protect you or die trying!"

"How do you know my name?" Booker asked as they pulled him through the running, yelling, shooting mob.

"Our leader said to tell you that she is-" The girl ducked, pulling Booker down with her. A bullet whizzed overhead. "How did she say? Oh! 'North of twenty, south of you.' Does that make any sense to you at all?"

"Your leader?" Booker said, and then laughed at the madness of it all. "Yes! Yes, it makes sense."

"That's good, because I don't understand it at all!" The girl slipped through a hole in the fence and pulled Booker after her.

_"Vite!"_ shouted a little boy further down in the woods. He was so young he still had a little girl's voice, and he was holding a pocket watch. _"Trente secondes!"_

Booker wasn't sure where they were running to, but it had to be better than that labor camp. He ducked under a low branch, veered around a cliff side, and stumbled straight through a glowing grey-and-purple tear. The world went dark, and he fell onto his knees. He might have been imagining it, but for a second, he thought he heard Elizabeth's sweet voice calling for him like in Columbia.

_"Booker? Booker! Keep your eyes open, Booker!"_


End file.
